The world’s richest man, Jeff Bezos, took to Instagram to announce the launch of the Bezos Earth Fund in an effort to tackle climate change. Founder and CEO of Amazon, his company has often faced critical views on its climate change policies. With this global initiative, he invites scientists, activists, and NGOs that have any possibility to preserve and protect the natural world to access the fund.
With a user base of 1.4 million on Instagram, Bezos expresses his views on climate change being the biggest threat to the planet. He wishes to work with others in exploring new ways of fighting the devastating impact of climate change. This fund would be issuing grants later this year.
Criticism for Amazon’s climate policies was discovered when a blog had hundreds of Amazon employees sharing their feedback on the climate policies of the company. The blog also calls out the company to do more towards combating climate change. There have been accusations of the company producing huge amounts of waste for their delivery packaging, and from harmful emissions from the vehicles used for delivery.
However, last September Amazon pledged to go carbon negative by 2040 and said it would move to electric vehicles for delivery. The company said it would order 1,00,000 electric delivery trucks.
His post said, “We can save earth. It’s going to take collective action from big companies, small companies, nation states, global organizations, and individuals.”