SAO PAULO / RIO, Brazil - May 18 - Greenpeace volunteers unfurled a 300 square metre banner in a massive area of deforestation in the Amazon rainforest this morning with the words 'KFC - Amazon Criminal' - in advance of Kentucky Fried Chicken's (KFC) Annual General Meeting in Louisville, Kentucky tomorrow.

Activists in 2 inflatable boats also protested against US commodities giant Cargill, at its illegal soya export facility in the heart of the Amazon, which supplies KFC with animal feed in Europe. They held up a banner saying 'Cargill Out', as rainforest soya was being prepared for export. Both protests highlight the fact that KFC is fuelling the destruction of the Amazon by selling cheap chicken fed on soya grown on deforested land.

Recent Greenpeace investigations (1) have traced the chain of rainforest destruction directly from the heart of the Amazon, via Cargill's facility, to KFC's European restaurants (2), which sell bucket-loads of cheap soya-fed chicken to millions of people every day.

"Deforestation, slavery, use of toxic chemicals, land theft, illegal farming and the extinction of rare species are a recipe for disaster in the Amazon rainforest, but they are ingredients in KFC's quest for cheap animal feed," said Greenpeace International Forest Campaign Coordinator Gavin Edwards. "Fast food companies like KFC must take Amazon deforestation off their menu before it is too late for the world's greatest rainforest."

The Amazon rainforest is being destroyed at an alarming rate and is in urgent need of protection. Since January 2003, nearly 70,000 km2 has been destroyed, equivalent to an area of rainforest the size of 6 football pitches every minute. Soya, which is mainly grown to feed animals, is a leading cause of this destruction. A report last month in Nature magazine (3) revealed that 40% of the Amazon will be lost by 2050 if current trends in agricultural expansion continue, threatening bio-diversity and massively contributing to climate change.

KFC is part of Yum! Brands, Inc., the world's largest restaurant chain which includes Pizza Hut, Taco Bell, A&W and other fast food companies. Greenpeace recently wrote to Yum! Brands, Inc. regarding the destruction of the Amazon, but the company claimed its soya is grown in other parts of Brazil. Yet Greenpeace has traced its supply chain and found that some comes from facilities that use soya grown in the Amazon rainforest.

Greenpeace is calling on KFC and Cargill to ensure that the animal feed they buy does not contribute to the destruction of the Amazon and that none of their soya products are genetically engineered.

Greenpeace is an independent, campaigning organisation that uses non-violent, creative confrontation to expose global environmental problems, and to force solutions essential to a green and peaceful future.

Notes to Editors:

(1) A copy of the "Eating up the Amazon' which documents the problems of soya in the Amazon is available at: http://www.greenpeace.org/international/press/reports/eating-up-the-amazon

(2) Greenpeace has key evidence including:

• US company Cargill, which owns an illegal export terminal at Santarem, is supplied by farms operating on rainforest land that has been illegally cleared for soya production.
  
  
• Almost all of the soya passing through this terminal is destined for Europe. In 2005 more than 50% went to the Netherlands, 31% went to the UK, Spain received 6.5% & 6% to France.
  
  
• Industry sources and Greepeace research have identified Cargill soya terminals in Europe, through which Cargill's amazon soya enters the continent, as a source of feed for KFC meat in the UK and Netherlands.

(3) Soares-Filho, B.S. et al., 2006. Modelling conservation in the Amazon basin. Nature 440:520-523. Published 23rd March 2006

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