Greenwashing and Fraud
This week an important claim was made against JBS was filed with the SEC. Mighty Earth, a small activist group, filed a whistleblower complaint against JBS with the US Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC) over JBS's USD2.3 billion Sustainability Linked bond. For context, JBS is the world’s largest meat processor with operations in over 20 countries. In 2021 JBS issued green bonds to investors.The bonds were linked to to the company's sustainability goal, to wit achieve net zero by 2040. The problem is that, in setting the benchmark environmental goal, JBS never included its Scope 3 emissions. In fact, the Second Party Opinion issued in respect of the securities concluded that the bonds “were not material to the whole corporate value chain as the KPI does not include Scope 3 emission...” The kicker here is that for JBS, Scope 3 emissions are responsible for an estimated 97% of the company’s footprint and therefore the non inclusion of Scope 3 in the...