Dominican Today.

Sao Paulo.– 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 have traced the chain of rainforest destruction directly from the heart of the Amazon, via Cargill’s facility, to KFC’s European restaurants, 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."