Jeff Bezos Pledges $10 Billion To Fight Climate Change, Planet’s ‘Biggest Threat’
Original Article by Amy Held on NPR
Photo by Cliff Owen/AP
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos announced Monday he is committing $10 billion to fight climate change, which he calls “the biggest threat to our planet.”
Bezos says the funds will go toward the creation of the Bezos Earth Fund.
“This global initiative will fund scientists, activists, NGOs — any effort that offers a real possibility to help preserve and protect the natural world,” he writes in an Instagram post. “I want to work alongside others both to amplify known ways and to explore new ways of fighting the devastating impact of climate change on this planet.”
Bezos adds, “It’s going to take collective action from big companies, small companies, nation states, global organizations, and individuals.”
But some Amazon workers, deeply critical of their employer’s own environmental record, say it is Amazon itself that has been complicit in the climate crisis and must change its ways.
“We applaud Jeff Bezos’ philanthropy, but one hand cannot give what the other is taking away,” Amazon Employees For Climate Justice said in a statement in response to the pledge.