From: mongabay.com
News Link: http://news.mongabay.com/2009/0624-marfrig_beef_amazon.html
Marfrig, the world's fourth largest beef trader, will no longer buy cattle raised in newly deforested areas within the Brazilian Amazon, reports Greenpeace. The announcement is a direct response to Greenpeace's Slaughtering the Amazon report, which linked illegal Amazon forest clearing to the cattle producers that supply raw materials to some of the world's most prominent consumer products companies. Marfrig was one several cattle firms named in the investigative report.
Slaughtering the Amazon has had immediate repercussions for the accused cattle companies. Brazil's three largest supermarket chains, Wal-Mart, Carrefour and Pão de Açúcar, last week announced they would suspend contracts with suppliers found to be involved in Amazon deforestation, while Bertin, the world's largest beef processor, saw its $90 million loan from the International Finance Corporation withdrawn. Meanwhile a Brazilian federal prosecutor has filed a billion dollar law suit against the cattle industry for environmental damage. Firms that market tainted meat may be subject to fines of 500 reais ($260) per kilo.
Winner of the Golden Chainsaw Award makes amendsGreenpeace reports that Blairo Maggi, the soy farmer-turned-governor of the Amazon state of Mato Grosso who the green group bestowed with the "Golden Chainsaw award" in 2005 for being "the Brazilian person who most contributed to Amazon destruction", is supporting Marfrig's initiative.
"Blairo Maggi... is supporting Marfrig’s implementation of the moratorium by pushing farmers to map their properties," said Greenpeace in a statement. "Satellite data of the forest cover will be made publicly available so that companies can identify farms engaged in ongoing deforestation and stop buying cattle products from them."
Paulo Adario, Greenpeace Amazon campaign director, said it is now time for other Brazilian cattle companies to follow Marfrig's lead.
“In the absence of leadership from President Lula, Marfrig and Governor Maggi have taken their own steps towards ending deforestation and pushing for climate solutions. The President and the rest of the cattle industry must now follow their example,” said Adario. "This initiative is an important step towards halting Amazonian destruction and the related greenhouse gases emissions."
Cattle ranching is the biggest driver of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon, accounting for roughly 80 percent of forest clearing. More than 38,600 square miles has been cleared for pasture since 1996, bringing the total area occupied by cattle ranches in the Brazilian Amazon to 214,000 square miles, an area larger than France. The legal Amazon, an region consisting of rainforests and a biologically-rich grassland known as cerrado, is now home to more than 80 million head of cattle, more than 85 percent of the total U.S. herd.