US and European parliamentarians call for JBS to be investigated for deforestation

Three lawmakers, from the United States, United Kingdom and the European Union, released a statement this Tuesday (4) in which they asked governments to investigate the Brazilian company JBS for its commercial practices and possible relationship with deforestation in the Amazon.

The request was made by Bob Menendez (Democrat), chairman of the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Ian Liddell-Grainger (Conservative), member of the British Parliament, and Norbert Lins (German, affiliated with the Christian Democrats), MEP and chairman of the Committee on Agriculture and Rural Development of the European Parliament (legislative arm of the European Union).

“As legislators in Europe and the United States, we have watched with growing concern the problematic business practices of the Brazilian company JBS, its parent company, J&F Investimentos, and its subsidiaries,” says the request.

“We are united in calling on the justice and security agencies of our respective governments to conduct coordinated investigations into JBS’ business practices to ensure that the company is forced to operate under the financial and environmental standards required of all businesses. We also encourage our governments to scrutinize JBS’ anti-competitive practices and assess whether the company’s abuses can permanently damage food production chains,” the lawmakers urged.

“We remain deeply concerned about JBS’ environmental discomfort in South America and the damage the company has caused to the Amazon rainforest, by obtaining cattle from farms that contribute to deforestation”, they accuse.

“Over the past decade, JBS has gained global notoriety for its involvement in a wide spectrum of criminal activities, having pleaded guilty to 1,500 bribery cases in Brazil as well as price fixing violations. US law on foreign bribery, and it still has to pay billions of dollars in criminal fines,” the document continues.

Lawmakers point out that Wesley and Joesley Batista remain the company’s majority shareholders, despite having been the target of several lawsuits. The two, however, are not in official command posts.

In 2016, the Federal Police discovered evidence of corruption practiced by the JBS group. In May 2017, Joesley and Wesley decided to anticipate the investigations and close a whistleblower agreement with the PGR (Attorney General’s Office) and file a leniency (complaint made by companies) with the MPF (Federal Attorney’s Office). They also made arrangements with US officials. In total, they gave up around R$ 12.4 billion, considering their own assets and those of J&F, but, in four years, they saw JBS shares triple in value.

In December, six European supermarket chains, including a subsidiary of Carrefour, said they would no longer sell some beef products from Brazil because of industry ties to deforestation in the Amazon rainforest. Many of the affected products are from JBS, the world’s largest meat processor, and one of the largest in the industry in the US.

The European boycotts were a reaction to an investigation by the organization Repórter Brasil, which alleged that JBS used beef from pasture cows in illegally deforested areas, in a scheme known as “cattle washing”. The scheme occurs when cattle raised on an illegally deforested plot of land are sold to a legitimate farm before being sold to a slaughterhouse to conceal their origin.

search for leaf, JBS did not comment.

Meat prices rose sharply in the US in 2021, and the Biden government blames market concentration among a few producing companies as one of the reasons for this. In July, the Biden government launched a $1 billion plan to encourage the advancement of small producers, as a way to combat market concentration. The president had a meeting with farmers and meat producers on Monday (3), to discuss the progress of the plan.

Senator Menendez had already filed a similar request for an investigation against JBS in August 2021. At the time, he asked the Treasury Department to investigate whether the company had used illicit proceeds to fund its US expansion. The company has made major acquisitions in the American market in recent decades.

The Democratic senator has also been putting pressure on Jair Bolsonaro’s government. In September, he sent a letter to the Biden government asking the American president to make it clear to Brazil that a democratic rupture would have serious consequences.