Norway has pledged up to USD 3 billion to a new Brazil-led initiative that aims to reward tropical countries for preserving their forests. The facility, known as the Tropical Forests Forever Fund (TFFF), was launched on 6 November 2025 ahead of the COP30 climate summit in Brazil and is designed to pay forest-countries based on measurable performance in maintaining or increasing forest cover.
According to the Norwegian government, the funding will be made available over a 10-year period and is conditional on other international partners joining the facility. Norway also noted that its contribution is not meant to exceed a fixed share of the total funding pool, underscoring that the mechanism is intended as a broad, multi-partner effort.
The TFFF targets tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests across the world. While the initiative has so far been discussed mostly in relation to the Amazon and the Congo Basin, the fund documents specify that eligible regions also include the Mekong basin and other tropical forest areas in Southeast Asia.
This means that large parts of Southeast Asia’s remaining rainforest — including lowland forests in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Laos, as well as semi-evergreen forest landscapes extending through Cambodia, Vietnam, and southern Thailand — could in principle qualify for funding, provided the participating countries meet the facility’s criteria. These include forest type, clarity of monitoring systems, and performance on deforestation trends.
The possibility that Southeast Asian nations may be included indicates that the TFFF could become a new financial channel for forest-rich countries in the region, many of which face ongoing pressure from agriculture, mining, hydropower development, and land-use change. The Mekong region alone contains millions of hectares of tropical forest that play a significant role in carbon storage and ecological stability across Asia.
Operational details for the fund are still being finalized. Countries will need to submit their forest data under the facility’s monitoring framework, and payments will be calibrated to verified forest-cover performance.
Norway has for years been one of the largest global contributors to forest conservation efforts, and its pledge signals continued Nordic engagement in international climate and forest finance. The extent to which Southeast Asian countries will take part in the new facility is expected to become clearer as the TFFF begins its first phase of implementation.
Source: https://tfff.earth/
Previous ScandAsia coverage
Norway’s pledge to the new Tropical Forests Forever Fund builds on a long history of supporting forest protection and sustainable land-use initiatives across Southeast Asia. Over the past decade, Norway has been one of the region’s most active partners in climate-related forest programmes.
In 2020, Indonesia received a performance-based payment of USD 56 million from Norway for verified reductions in emissions from deforestation. The payment covered Indonesia’s achievements in 2016 and 2017 under the two countries’ cooperation on forests and climate.
https://scandasia.com/indonesia-to-receive-56-million-reward-from-norway-for-reducing-emission/
In 2022, Norway entered a new agreement with Indonesia to purchase carbon credits from rainforest conservation efforts. The partnership focused on reducing forest loss, improving land-use governance and supporting Indonesia’s long-term climate commitments.
https://scandasia.com/norway-buys-carbon-credits-from-indonesias-rainforest/
Norwegian support has also appeared through civil-society channels. In 2016, a Norwegian environmental organisation played a key role in efforts that contributed to Malaysia’s decision to cancel a major hydropower dam project in Sarawak. The dam would have flooded significant rainforest areas and affected indigenous communities.
https://scandasia.com/norwegian-ngo-contributes-to-malaysia-scrapping-mega-dam/
Earlier, Norway’s engagement with Vietnam included cooperation on reducing emissions from the forest sector, particularly through the REDD+ framework. The two countries highlighted forest-related climate action as part of bilateral discussions in Hanoi.
https://scandasia.com/norway-and-vietnams-prime-ministers-held-talks-in-hanoi/
The new contribution to the Tropical Forests Forever Fund (TFFF) represents a continuation of Norway’s long-standing commitment to forest protection in Southeast Asia and may extend similar forms of performance-based conservation finance to a broader set of tropical forest countries, including those in the Mekong region.
