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Friday, October 20, 2023

Soy exporter BUNGE caught destroying the Cerrado savannah

Bunge, a global commodity trader headquartered in the United States, is the main supplier of soy animal feed to the meat industry in the European Union. Bunge is one of the biggest soy players in Brazil's Cerrado, next to ADM, and Cargill. The Cerrado savannah, which borders the Amazon rainforest and makes up nearly a quarter of Brazil's territory, sequesters vast amounts of climate-warming greenhouse gas in its vegetation through their deep roots. Roughly half of the Cerrado has been destroyed to date, largely to make way for farming of soy, beef, corn and other agricultural products.

A recent report of the environmental group Mighty Earth found that Bunge bought soy from three farms responsible for 11,351 hectares of deforestation in the Cerrado, cleared after 2021. Their partner organisation AidEnvironment detected another five cases of deforestation that took place in early 2023, in high-risk areas where Bunge is the leading soy exporter.

Already in November 2020, major retailers and food companies including Tesco, Walmart, Unilever and McDonald's urged Bunge to commit to the ‘Cerrado Manifesto’, asking the company to stop sourcing soy, directly or indirectly, from areas cleared in the Cerrado after 2020. Bunge fails to comply with the 2020 deforestation cut-off date, also required by the new European Deforestation Regulation (EUDR). Instead, Bunge claims that it does not purchase soy from illegally deforested areas in the Cerrado and is working to eliminate all deforestation from its supply chains by 2025.

Major retailers in Europe have now launched investigations into the deforestation allegations linked to Bunge, including Carrefour (France), Aldi Süd (Germany), Casino and Ahold Delhaize (The Netherlands). Bunge must immediately implement the 2020 deforestation cut-off date and suspend farms and suppliers that violate this no deforestation policy.

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YOU normally don't know on which routes the product was transported nor how many chemicals were used during the process of production nor if there are transgenes in your food. Through the last decades giantic food suppliers emerged conducting worldwide activities. Their budget even exceeds the gross domestic product (GDP) of some European countries. There are three international food companies making the highest profits (net income 2022):

NESTLÉ made 10,2 billion USD, second is UNILEVER earning 8,3 billion USD, third place is MONDELĒZ International (formerly Kraft Foods Inc.) making 4,3 billion USD and last is KRAFT HEINZ (merger of Kraft Foods Group and H.J. Heinz) with 1,0 billion USD.

These food multinationals can partly be blamed for the uneven distribution of wealth on the world. Scan products with the Buycott App before you shop (Sign Up).