A Greenpeace Brasil investigation revealed that cattle raised inside the Serra Ricardo Franco State Park, in Mato Grosso (MT), supplied JBS. The Paredão farm, located within the park, sold at least 4,000 head of cattle to the Barra Mansa farm, which is located outside the protected area and supplied cattle directly to JBS’s meatpacking plant in Pontes e Lacerda. During the same period, this plant exported meat to 25 countries, including the United Kingdom, Germany, and Saudi Arabia.

JBS bought cattle from the area with the highest number of fires in the Amazon, according to an investigation by Repórter Brasil. According to the report, the cattle purchased by the company came from a farm located within the Triunfo do Xingu Environmental Protection Area (APA) in the state of Pará—the conservation unit that recorded the highest number of fires in Brazil in 2019.

JBS continued to buy cattle from farms with areas embargoed for illegal deforestation, even after being fined around R$25 million (approximately US$ 8 million at the time the fines were issued) in 2017 by the Operation Carne Fria, according to an investigation by Repórter Brasil, the British newspaper The Guardian, and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism. The investigation indicates that the properties belonged to AgroSB, also known as Santa Bárbara, owned by businessman Daniel Dantas, who has a history of socio-environmental violations. At the Lagoa do Triunfo farm—where the deforestation occurred—hundreds of head of cattle were transferred for fattening to another AgroSB property with no environmental infractions, from which the animals were then sold for slaughter at JBS slaughterhouses.