Banks and beef
BankTrack

BankTrack
The beef industry is a major contributor to nature destruction, climate change and the spread of pandemics, while also having links to widespread human and Indigenous rights violations. In order to tackle these four emergencies, banks must act urgently and decisively to address the impacts linked to their financing of the beef sector.
Recent research by the UNEP and the IPCC has shown that, in addition to cutting carbon dioxide emissions, drastically reducing methane emissions is the best way to rapidly avert the climate crisis and limit global warming to 1.5°C. The livestock sector alone is responsible for 32% of all human caused methane emissions and, if current trends continue, the global meat and dairy industry will account for almost half the world’s 1.5°C emissions budget by 2030. This means that an urgent shift to restrict and reverse the growth of industrial livestock is essential to avert the climate crisis.
Beef production is the top driver of deforestation in the world’s tropical forests and drives conversion of non-forest landscapes from grasslands to savannas. In addition, around 80% of the world’s soybean production is used to feed animals to produce meat and dairy products, with soybean production being the second biggest driver of tropical deforestation. Halting and reversing deforestation and fire in natural ecosystems such as the Amazon is of extreme urgency, but research shows that, as of 2020, some 57 million hectares of the Brazilian Amazon is now under cattle ranching.
The beef industry is also tied to widespread human and Indigenous rights violations. Cattle farming is the main driver of illegal land seizures on Reserves and Indigenous territories in the Brazilian Amazon. Mongabay have documented how violent displacement and killings of indigenous peoples in Nicaragua have been committed in pursuit of grazing cattle on deforested land. Additionally, evidence of worker exploitation including modern slavery and child labour has been found throughout the industry, particularly in Brazilian and Paraguayan bovin stockbreeding and meatpacking plants globally.
Scientists have warned that intensive livestock farming increases the risk for development of viruses and UNEP has warned that the increasing human demand for animal protein is one of the main drivers of the emergence of zoonotic diseases and antimicrobial resistance. Overuse of antibiotics for livestock is considered one of the biggest current threats to global health, food security, and development by the World Health Organisation.
Role of banks
Banks play a role in continuing to finance industrial beef companies that have adverse impacts on climate, nature, human rights and risk contributing to the spread of future pandemics. Since 2016, financial institutions have provided over US$ 67 billion to the Brazilian beef sector. This includes finance to some of the biggest and baddest beef companies like JBS, Minerva and Marfrig, all of which are profiled on the BankTrack website.
Read more about the role of banks in curbing the expansion of industrial beef production in our blog: Our nature and climate demand a reduction of industrial beef production, but banks missed the memo
Policy analysis
The Forest & Finance coalition, of which BankTrack is a part, assess the policies of 200 of the largest banks and investors active in six key commodities sectors driving deforestation and land degradation in Southeast Asia, Central and West Africa, and parts of Latin America.
The table in the Policy section below presents the analysis of commercial and development bank’s policies related to beef. For a summary of the compiled policy assessments and for the details on the scoring criteria, check the Forests & Finance website here.
The table below presents the analysis of commercial and development bank’s policies related to beef. For a summary of the compiled policy assessments and for the details on the scoring criteria, check the Forests & Finance website here.
Forest & Finance Policy Assessment 2022: Beef
A bank can obtain a total of 10 points for the quality of its beef policy. The total score is based on their scores per sector, weighted against their financing and investment for each sector. For further details on this see here. Based on their overall score, banks are then classified as Laggards, Followers, Front runners or Leaders, as follows: