Santa Catarina is a state in the South Region of Brazil. It is the 7th smallest state in total area and the 11th most populous. Additionally, it is the 9th largest settlement, with 295 municipalities. The state, which has 3.4% of the Brazilian population, is responsible for 3.8% of the Brazilian GDP.
Pilgrim's Pride Corporation is an American, multi-national food company, currently one of the largest chicken producers in the United States and Puerto Rico and the second-largest chicken producer in Mexico. It exited bankruptcy in December 2009 and relocated its U.S. headquarters to Greeley, Colorado, in 2011. It is majority-owned by JBS S.A.. Pilgrim's Pride purchased Gold'n Plump for $350 million in late November 2016.
Cargill, Inc. is a privately held American global food corporation based in Minnetonka, Minnesota, and incorporated in Wilmington, Delaware. Founded in 1865, it is the largest privately held corporation in the United States in terms of revenue. If it were a public company, it would rank, as of 2015, number 15 on the Fortune 500, behind McKesson and ahead of AT&T. Cargill has frequently been the subject of criticism related to the environment, human rights, finance, and other ethical considerations.
The South Region of Brazil is one of the five regions of Brazil. It includes the states of Paraná, Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Sul and covers 576,409.6 square kilometres (222,553.0 sq mi), being the smallest portion of the country, occupying only about 6.76% of the territory of Brazil. Its whole area is smaller than that of the state of Minas Gerais, in Southeast Brazil, for example.
JBS USA Holdings, Inc. is an American food processing company and a wholly owned subsidiary of the Brazilian company JBS S.A.. The subsidiary was created when JBS entered the U.S. market in 2007 with its purchase of Swift & Company.
ContiGroup Companies, Inc (CGC) was founded by Simon Fribourg in Arlon, Belgium, in 1813 as a grain-trading firm. Formerly known as Continental Grain, ContiGroup has expanded into a multinational corporation with offices and facilities in 10 countries while employing more than 13,500 people worldwide. Today, CGC is one of the largest privately held corporations in the United States.
Faccenda Foods Limited is a privately owned UK business established in 1962 by Robin Faccenda, which supplies fresh poultry products.
JBS S.A. is a Brazilian company that is the largest meat processing company in the world, producing factory processed beef, chicken and pork, and also selling by-products from the processing of these meats. It is headquartered in São Paulo. It was founded in 1953 in Anápolis, Goiás. As of 2017, the company had 150 industrial plants around the world. J&F Investimentos is a 42% indirect shareholder in JBS S.A., which is listed on American stock markets as JBSAY. J&F Investimentos is wholly owned by Joesley Batista and Wesley Batista. As of May 2017, JBS S.A. remains the world's biggest butcher.
BRF S.A. is a Brazilian food processing company. BRF is one of the biggest food companies in the world, with over 30 brands in its portfolio, among them Sadia, Perdigão, Qualy, Paty, Dánica and Bocatti. Its products are sold in over 150 countries, in all five continents. More than 100 thousand employees work at the company, which owns more than 50 factories in eight countries: Argentina, Brazil, United Arab Emirates, Netherlands, Malaysia, United Kingdom, Thailand and Turkey.
Marfrig is the second largest Brazilian food processing company, after JBS. The company is headquartered in São Paulo. The company has an operational base in 22 countries, exporting to over 100, and is the second-largest beef producer in the world.
Doux Group, founded in 1955 and headquartered in Châteaulin, Finistère (France), is a French food processing company in the industrial poultry production business, exporting poultry-based processed products. In 2014, it was ranked as the largest producer of poultry in Europe, and the third largest in the world. The group is led by Arnaud Marion, who has been the CEO of Doux since late 2012.
OSI Group is an American privately owned holding company of meat processors that service the retail and food service industries with international headquarters in Aurora, Illinois. It operates over 65 facilities in 17 countries. Sheldon Lavin is the owner, CEO and chairman.
Moy Park is a Northern Ireland based poultry meat producer, the largest meat producer in Northern Ireland, with operations in the Republic of Ireland, France, Great Britain and the Netherlands.
J&F Investimentos SA is a private investment holding company that was founded in 1953 and is based in São Paulo, Brazil. The company is involved in myriad business endeavors, such as agribusiness, manufacturing, marketing and sales, electricity generation, waste management, real estate, and publishing, among others. J&F Investimentos is owned by the Batista family of Brazil.
The Operation Carne Fraca, is an action started on March 17, 2017 and enforced by the Federal Police of Brazil, that country's federal police force, which investigated some of the country's largest meat processing companies.
The meat industry has been severely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States. Outbreaks of the virus have taken place in factories operated by the meat packing industry and the poultry processing industry. These outbreaks affected dozens of plants, leading to closures of some factories and disruption of others, and posed a significant threat to the meat supply in the United States. By April 27, there were at least 115 facilities with cases across 23 states, and at least 4,913 workers diagnosed positive with COVID-19, or approximately 3 percent of the workforce, with 20 deaths reported. By May 5, over 10,000 meatpacking plant workers in 29 states and working at 170 plants had tested positive for the coronavirus. At least 45 of those meat industry workers had died. As of May 20, at least 15,300 workers have been infected with COVID-19 at 192 different meatpacking plants in the United States, based on ongoing reporting by the Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting and USA Today. At least 63 of those workers have died from the disease.
During the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada, outbreaks of the virus took place in factories operated by the meat packing industry and the poultry processing industry. These outbreaks affected multiple plants, leading to closures of some factories and disruption of others, and posing a threat to the food supply in Canada.
On May 30, 2021, JBS S.A., a Brazil-based meat processing company, suffered a cyberattack, disabling its beef and pork slaughterhouses. The attack impacted facilities in the United States, Canada, and Australia.
US$ 5.5 billion (2018) 