"China plays a growing role in the future of the planet’s tropical forests, but a new report says its financial flows are going in the wrong direction."
"Chinese banks have become the biggest international funders of companies that trade in goods linked to deforestation, a trend that could further imperil the world’s most climate-critical forests, environmental advocates say.
A new report from the advocacy group Global Witness, published Thursday, tracks financing from China’s top banks to companies that rely on the world’s tropical rainforests for commodities, including timber, pulp, paper, beef, soy and palm oil. It finds that major Chinese banks bankrolled a total of $23 billion to these businesses between 2018 and the middle of 2024.
From 2013 to 2018 China provided only $12 billion in credit to companies that source products that have higher risks of causing deforestation. Over the next five years, from 2019 to 2024, that figure jumped to $20.1 billion. The increase indicates “that the financial sector has failed to adjust lending practices to mitigate the damage some of these companies are wreaking upon global forests,” the report says."
Georgina Gustin reports for Inside Climate News May 30, 2025.
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