AMAZON EMERGENCY: TELL MEGA RETAILERS TO TAKE ACTION NOW!

Dear CEO,

We are writing to urge you to take immediate and concrete action to protect the Amazon rainforest and other ecosystems that are being devastated by deforestation driven by huge cattle and soy animal feed companies.

Human rights and conservation organizations across the world have called for an International Global Day of Action for the Amazon on Sept 5.  Many of the actions will focus on consumer companies and global brands tied to the suppliers creating the incentive for the destruction we are witnessing.  

It is our hope that you will stand with us by taking decisive action now.

The burning of the Amazon and the darkening of skies have captured the world’s conscience. But while much of the blame for the fires has rightly fallen on Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro for directly encouraging the burning of forests and the seizure of Indigenous Peoples’ lands the incentive for the destruction comes from large-scale international meat and soy animal feed companies like JBS, Marfrig, and Cargill.

Global brands like Stop & Shop Costco, Walmart / Asda, and Leclerc that buy from them and sell to the public are creating the international demand that finances the fires and deforestation.

For years, companies like yours have politely urged deforesters to do better.
 
Ten years ago, Consumer Goods Forum (CGF) members made a commitment to end deforestation in their supply chains by 2020, with an emphasis on high risk commodities such as soy, cattle, palm oil, and pulp and paper.  Five years later, at the 2014 Climate Summit in New York, 60 additional companies joined in this pledge as a part of the landmark New York Declaration on Forests.

As the 2020 deadline approaches, it is increasingly apparent that the majority of these companies will fail to achieve this goal.

While your company and others urged reform in the supply chain, they have continued to purchase large quantities of meat and soy animal feed from those same deforesters – even as your calls for change were ignored.

As a result, the companies most directly responsible for driving deforestation, such as Cargill, Bunge, and JBS, have been able to continue business as usual without significant consequences. It is largely because of this failure to act that the Amazon is burning today.

It is time for talking to end and action to begin. Not in ten more years, not in five. Today.

We call on your company to:

• Immediately cease purchases and financing of any company responsible for destruction of forests and other native ecosystems or the theft of Indigenous and local community lands and adopt an immediate supplier suspension policy for future violations.

• Establish industry-wide mechanisms to monitor and stop destruction of native ecosystems across South America.

• Establish and implement a zero-tolerance policy for attacks on environmental and human rights defenders and civil society advocates.

• Move rapidly towards only buying from countries that are increasing their natural forest cover and protecting the rights of Indigenous Peoples, including Free Prior and Informed Consent.

• Work with civil society to actively and publicly support government efforts to protect native ecosystems and the rights of Indigenous Peoples and local communities through stronger regulatory frameworks and enforcement.

• Require suppliers to implement regenerative agro-ecological farming practices that verifiably improve soil health, water quality, and biodiversity.

• Set a public, science-based target to rapidly shift a significant portion of protein sales towards plant-based options.

The pathway to sustainability requires protecting native ecosystems, upholding the rights of local communities and indigenous peoples, and transitioning to models of production based on agro-ecological methods and agroforestry.  The first step is to end the destruction happening today by taking accountability for your role in the catastrophe unfolding in South America, and once and for all provide your customers products that are compatible with a living planet and human rights.

Signatures Below Next Letter

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Open Letter from Civil Society to the Global Finance Community





The Amazon is on fire. Investors share the blame. They need to become part of the solution.

The primary blame for the current burning of the Amazon is being placed, rightly, on the violent, regressive and racist administration of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who has explicitly encouraged illegal miners and ranchers to set fire to the lungs of the earth. But reckless multinational businesses’ exploitative practices created these conditions – and these same companies will likely be poised to profit as today’s fires opens up the door for tomorrow’s plantations and ranches.

These companies do not act alone: behind them are the banks and institutional investors that provide the credit and equity financing that enables their operations and drives massive deforestation: institutions like BlackRock, JP Morgan Chase, Santander, BNP Paribas, HSBC and countless others. These financiers do not only enable the destruction of our forests – they profit from it.

The fate of the Amazon is the fate of the world. Today we call on you, the banks and institutional investors that provide debt and equity financing, to use your money, which in many cases is our money, to directly challenge Bolsonaro’s destructive agenda in Brazil.

We call on you to immediately suspend all financing to agribusiness firms active in the Brazilian Amazon and the Cerrado until and unless you can take longer term, systemic actions to:

* Require all agribusiness companies with whom you do business to ensure public traceability of supply chains to the point of origin and commit to ending deforestation in their supply chains.

* Require all agribusiness companies with whom you do business to publicly disclose ESG risks related to deforestation and land rights, including any investigations, indictments or fines issued for deforestation and/or land grabbing.

* Require all agribusiness companies with whom you do business to adopt and implement a zero tolerance policy for violence against environment and human rights defenders.

* Adopt a due diligence policy, including a transparent stakeholder engagement mechanism, to monitor agribusiness companies operating in sensitive forest ecosystems for any evidence of deforestation, and take immediate action to suspend business in cases of non-compliance.

* Require all agribusiness companies to audit supply chains for operations on legally-recognized indigenous territories and/or in areas in which indigenous peoples are fighting for legal territorial recognition, and exclude these companies from portfolios.

* Support shareholder resolutions and public policy efforts that advance supply chain transparency, respect for human rights, native ecosystem protections, and compliance with the Paris Climate Accord.

If you are a bank extending credit to agribusiness interests domiciled in or active in Brazil and you cannot take these actions – it’s time to cancel your loans.

If you are an institutional investor holding shares in companies with operations in the Amazon or the Cerrado and you cannot take these actions – it’s time to divest.

Fiduciary duty means putting out the fires. To put out the fires, cut off the fuel. Defund Deforestation!



Jeff Conant, Senior International Forests Program Manager, Friends of the Earth, U.S.

Mathew Jacobson, Senior Forest Director, Mighty Earth


Atossa Soltani, Amazon Watch

Noah Greenwald, Center for Biological Diversity

Jake Schmidt, Natural Resources Defense Council

Salih Booker, Center for International Policy

Ginger Cassady, Rainforest Action Network  

Michael Brune, Sierra Club

Anna Wallin, Danmarks Naturfredningsforening

James Whitehead, Forest Peoples Programme

Marc Ona Essangui, Brainforest

Sylvain Angerand, Canopée

Electa Sevier, Mothers Out Front

Reinhard Behrend, Rettet den Regenwald

Dena Blumenthal, The Humane League

Richard Michel, Climate Reality

Fatah Sadaoui, SumOfUs

André-Yanne Parent, The Climate Reality Project Canada

Masja  Helmer, Both ENDS

Susan Power, Al-Haq

Tara Thornton, Endangered Species Coalition

Anja Dragomirović, Center for Environment

RL Miller, Climate Hawks Vote

Chuck Willer, Coast Range Association

Charity Ryerson, Corporate Accountability Lab

Michelle Cook, Divest Invest Protect

Daniel Cerqueira, Due Process of Law Foundation

Meg  Sheehan, EcoLawDefenders

Aryenish Birdie, Encompass

Thomas  Wheeler, Environmental Protection Information Center

Emily Goldman, ESG Transparency Initiative

Martin Luiga, Estonian Forest Aid

Matt BUtler, Everyone Orchestra

Shona Cattan, Extinction Rebellion

Erin Eberle, Farm Forward

Paul Hughes, FORESTS FOREVER

Randy Hayes, Foundation Earth  

Eva Altepost, FOUR PAWS  

Phil White, Grounded

Caroline Mordaunt, Healer

Carlos Matías  Callegari, Hospital Alemán  

Juliette Majot, IInstitute for Agriculture and Trade Policy

Heather Rosmarin, InterAmerican Clean Energy Institute

Alexandre Andrade Sampaio, International Accountability Project  

Margaret Zhou, International Rivers

Kimberly  Baker , Klamath Forest Alliance

Michael Dotson, Klamath-Siskiyou Wildlands Center

Dhanada Mishra, KMBB

Max Klose, LANUV NRW

Colombe Nadeau-O'Shea, Mercy For Animals

Tim Hermach, Native Forest Council

Jonathan Westin, New York Communities for Change (NYCC)

Rebecca  Cramer, Northland Sustainable Solutions

Peter Schurman, One Global Democracy

Alexander Lee, Project Laundry List

Andreas Missbach, Public Eye

Michael Kellett, RESTORE: The North Woods Inc

Carol Hautau, Salem Alliance for the Environment

Sarah Killer, Sama Sanctuary

Lúcia Gomes Pereira, Sinergia Animal

Nicholas Smith, Tech Five

Nigel Pitman, The Field Museum

Alicia Rodriguez, The Land and Sea Institute

Jordan Abhold, TransChance Health

Carolina Urrutia, Transforma  

Carlos Nobre, USP

Thomas Peter Mygind, Valk Solutions

elena KRAGULJ, Viaje a la Sostenibilidad

Jesse Kocher, Walk Score

Osprey Orielle Lake, Women's Earth and Climate Action Network (WECAN)

flavia broffoni, XR

Marion Aechter-Droege, Frauenkraft