US climate chief John Kerry said Wednesday he expected bold new action from Mexico’s and Brazil’s next governments, raising hopes of progress at this month’s summit in Egypt.

Kerry also made his firmest suggestion yet that the United States stands ready to work to compensate poor nations already severely affected by climate change, which will be a key agenda item at the talks known as COP27.

In Brazil, where the Amazon plays a key role in tackling the planet’s carbon emissions, left-wing former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva won Sunday’s elections against far-right incumbent Jair Bolsonaro, a rainforest agribusiness ally.

In his victory speech, Lula pledged to work towards zero deforestation.

“President-elect Lula is committed,” Kerry told reporters in Washington, noting Lula’s environmental efforts as president in the first decade of the century.

“Now I hope we’ll be able to refine this program and move even faster on the reforms needed to try to save the Amazon,” Kerry said.

“Unfortunately, under the Bolsonaro administration, the rate of deforestation in the Amazon increased and is now at dangerously high levels.”

Kerry insisted he was not “deaf” to economic concerns around the world, including Brazil, Latin America’s largest economy, noting that many Amazonians made a living from cattle or logging.

“We in the rest of the world need to realize that if we want to appreciate this great forest, we need to help them conserve it,” he said.

Kerry, a former Secretary of State and key architect of the 2015 Paris Agreement, has returned to his world tour in his climate role and recently visited Mexico to mobilize action ahead of COP27.

He said he expects that in the coming days more countries will increase their ambition through their so-called nationally determined contributions, plans they are submitting under the Paris Agreement.

“We’re going to have an important announcement that President (Andres Manuel) Lopez Obrador has agreed to regarding what Mexico is going to do now,” Kerry said.