Menu
Log in


Buffalo River Watershed Alliance

Log in

More JBS charges By Mike Masterson

25 Mar 2017 7:46 AM | Anonymous member (Administrator)

Arkansasonline


More JBS charges

By Mike Masterson

Posted: March 25, 2017 at 2:31 a.m.


The Brazil-based meatpacker that provides and purchases the more than 6,000 swine raised by C&H Hog Farms in the Buffalo National River watershed is in trouble after police say it was caught giving payoffs to inspectors and politicians to allow the sale of spoiled meat.

As a result of a two-year investigation, the European Commission says it's carefully monitoring the JBS meat corporation and another major meatpacker it alleges were criminally shelling out cash to influence Brazilian officials.

The corporation's JBS USA subsidiary purchased Cargill Inc.'s U.S. pork business--which includes the Mount Judea hog factory--for $1.45 billion in November 2015. That was about three years after Cargill was pivotal in launching and supporting the privately owned C&H facility that our state officials so quickly and quietly permitted into our sacred Buffalo watershed.

In Brazil, a judge accused the Ministry of Agriculture of selecting inspectors who approved substandard meat for market. A two-year police investigation alleges JBS and another major meatpacker in that country also channeled bribes to two of Brazil's major political parties, including that of the Brazilian president. News accounts say dozens of arrest warrants have been issued.

One Brazilian investigator said during a new conference that the meatpackers were using chemicals to improve the appearance and smell of expired meats, and that good meat supposedly was mixed with bad, and water and a gluten-free flour also added as a disguise.

The investigation also reportedly revealed that schoolchildren in southern Brazil were being fed "outdated, rotten and many times cancerous" meats to benefit the financial interests of a "crime gang."

As if these allegations weren't bad enough, in 2016 the JBS chairman and eight other company officials were charged with financial crimes involving loans.

It's troublesome to me that the international corporate contractors behind our state's large swine factory are in trouble back home for alleged financial crimes and bribes to allow rotten meat into markets and schools. Officials within the European Union were inflamed enough by the charges to halt meat exports from JBS and another Brazilian company called BRF.

While there's no connection between what happens in Brazil and the factory at Mount Judea, this company's reported practices naturally catch my attention and that of others across Arkansas.

Buffalo River Watershed Alliance is a non profit 501(c)(3) organization

Copyright @ 2019


Powered by Wild Apricot Membership Software