Brazil: Chicken found in Europe’s leading supermarkets linked to deforestation, land grabbing, corruption and violence against communities, says Earthsight; incl. companies'comments
"EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: SECRET INGREDIENT", 26 September 2024
...Earthsight’s latest investigation traces soy linked to illegal deforestation, land grabbing, corruption, and violence against traditional communities in the Brazilian Cerrado to chicken found on the shelves of Europe’s leading supermarkets – Carrefour, Intermarché, Edeka and Albert Heijn – and in fast-food giant McDonald’s. This tainted soy, used as feed in European chicken farms, is the secret ingredient in popular chicken products that links unwitting consumers to destruction and rights abuses in the Brazilian Cerrado.
...In 2023, the highest portion of Cerrado deforestation was concentrated in the state of Bahia, where the three agribusinesses at the centre of Earthsight’s new investigation grow soy on hundreds of thousands of hectares (ha) of land: the Horita Group, the Franciosi Agro Group, and the Mizote Group.
...[They]...are certified by the Round Table on Responsible Soy (RTRS) – a certification scheme that aims to ensure soy supply chains are ethical and sustainable. But as this investigation shows, flaws in RTRS’s standard and processes risk facilitating the greenwashing of the Cerrado’s deforesters. In response to Earthsight’s findings, RTRS has suspended the certificates for both Horita and Franciosi Agro while the scheme carries out an investigation into their compliance...
Tainted soy from Horita, Franciosi Agro and Mizote is exported to the EU by two of the world’s largest soy traders: Bunge and Cargill. Around 90 per cent of soy entering Europe is processed into animal feed to supply the meat industry. Bunge and Cargill sell soy to leading European feed companies, including De Heus.
Chicken fed with De Heus’ animal feed is purchased by Plukon Food Group which, as Europe’s fourth largest chicken slaughterhouse, sells chicken products to shops across the EU. Earthsight investigators have identified Plukon chicken products in some of Europe’s largest retailers: Carrefour and Intermarché in France, Edeka in Germany, and Albert Heijn in the Netherlands. Plukon also supplies chicken to McDonald’s, meaning European consumers not only risk being complicit in environmental and rights abuses when they do their grocery shopping, but also when they purchase the fast-food chain’s popular chicken menu items.
RTRS and all companies mentioned in the report were contacted for comment. Their responses can be found throughout the report and accessed in full here...