Eight South American countries have agreed to launch an alliance to protect the Amazon, pledging at a summit in Brazil to stop the world’s biggest rainforest from reaching a point of no return.

Eight South American countries have agreed to launch an alliance to protect the Amazon, pledging at a summit in Brazil to stop the world’s biggest rainforest from reaching a point of no return. Leaders from South American nations also challenged developed countries to do more to stop the enormous destruction of the world’s largest rainforest, a task they said cannot fall to just a few countries when the crisis has been caused by so many.

The closely-watched summit of the Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization adopted on Tuesday what host country Brazil called a new and ambitious shared agenda to save the rainforest, a crucial buffer against climate change that experts warn is being pushed to the brink of collapse. The group’s members, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Peru, Suriname and Venezuela, signed a joint declaration in Belem, at the mouth of the Amazon River, laying out a nearly 10,000-word roadmap to promote sustainable development, end deforestation and fight the organised crime that fuels it.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who has staked his international reputation on improving Brazil’s environmental standing, had been pushing for the region to unite behind a common policy of ending deforestation by 2030.