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The Amazon Bioeconomy Is Investable. If Capital Learns to Listen

  • Jul 1
  • 2 min read

Wednesday, 1st July 2026

By Paula Perrelli dos Anjos



At King’s Brazil Institute during London Climate Action Week, Amazonia Impact Ventures (AIV) brought together practitioners, policymakers and investors for a discussion that cut through the noise surrounding the Amazon bioeconomy. For all its prominence in climate debates, one point kept resurfacing: finance still struggles to reach the forest communities who actually sustain it.


Moderator Giulia Galebe, International Partnerships for Fundação Amazônia Sustentável (FAS), set the tone early. “If we know the asset classes,” she asked, “why does capital still stall before it reaches the ground?”

Manuella Cantalice, regenerative finance designer, founder of New Animal and advisor to Brazil’s Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF), argued that the blockage is economic rather than political. “TFFF is designed to move from aid to investment,” she said. “It’s a simple mechanism to attract USD 25 billion and unlock USD 100 billion. Less layering, more access. Communities need finance that adapts to their reality.”

For AIV’s Co‑Founder and Investment Director, Pajani Singah, there is a fundamental mismatch in the market, where investors are looking to deploy US$ 5-10 million, while Amazonian cooperatives need just US$ 50k-250k to purchase, process and export forest. “In the global south, every dollar counts. We start partnerships with humility, listening first, then structuring capital that banks won’t touch because of perceived risk.”

He pointed to Peru's Bioeconomy Road Map, recently developed by the Ministry of Environment, as an example to accelerate a sustainable, inclusive and forest-positive bioeconomy. AIV’s work in Peru supported by UK PACT, a programme funded by the UK Government, is helping to close the finance gap with specialised, risk-tolerant capital while shifting value creation into the Amazon itself. Its early pilots, from an aguaje oil processing plant to forest-to-buyer traceability systems for Amazon nuts, are designed to demonstrate how bio-based manufacturing, certification and direct links to anchor buyers can strengthen local livelihoods while regenerating natural capital. 


Brazil’s Special Envoy for Bioeconomy, Marcelo Behar, widened the frame. “Europe talks about climate change, Latin America about deforestation, Africa about desertification: three names for the same problem,” he said. “Bioeconomy in our region is social development. Eleven Million hectares of forest disappear every year. We need community‑led models because they know how to do it.” TFFF, he added, is designed to combine forest protection with traditional knowledge across 323 biomes. “Bioeconomy doesn’t need a premium. It needs policy, finance and training.” 

By the end of the session, the discussion was clear. The Amazon bioeconomy is already being built, in cooperatives, in national strategies, in new financial mechanisms taking shape across Brazil and Peru. What is needed now is alignment: capital that recognises how bioeconomy functions on the ground and is willing to work with the systems communities have spent generations defining.


A warm thank you to our panellists, and to Andreza de Sousa Santos, whose support was essential to making this conversation possible. 



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