BBF Meeting with JBS (New Huon Aquaculture Owner)

Transcript of media conference at Bob Brown Foundation offices, Hobart, Thursday 11 November 2021, regarding discussion with JBS.

Bob Brown

Christine Milne, Bec Howarth, Bob Brown. We met this morning with the field officers of JBS the global corporation which has now taken over Huon Aquaculture. They explained what we already knew that they’re in this period of having bought Huon Aquaculture they’ve been to the court and they are yet to officially take over ownership.

We were very direct with them that the aquaculture industry in Tasmania is damaging to the environment, it’s not been socially oriented. And we support the Dennes Point Declaration, which involves removing those destructive fish farms out of Tasmania’s waterways, and if necessary, bringing them ashore, it’s up to them what they do with them.

Now we got a direct commitment that they will not damage the environment, quote, unquote. It will be up to the company now to carry through with that commitment across the table to our foundation today. We made it very clear that the damage accruing to the marine environment, including the loss of native fisheries, the cruelty to seals, the threat to rare and endangered species, the massive amounts of fish faeces going into the water damaging marine ecosystems, has to be brought to a halt. And not only that, reversed. We’re not in favour of this industry expanding around further the coastline of Tasmania.

So they made few commitments, said though we’re here to listen, but did commit to providing us with baseline studies for Huon Aquaculture’s previous operations in the Huon and the Channel. We’ll see, because those baseline studies have been non existent in our experience in the past. We also are alarmed about the threat to Storm Bay of course. Bec you might like to say a few words.

Rebecca Howarth

This morning, I informed JBS that we are putting big salmon on notice. We informed them that we want to see the full restoration of our inshore shallow waters around Tasmania’s coast, and that we want to see no more salmon pens going into Tasmania’s coastal waters. The community and the environment have reached a tipping point right now where they have endured years of the industry telling us and telling them that they will see change with nothing but expansion put in front of us.

Journalist – unidentified

What did they say about expansion, future expansion and the possibilities?

Rebecca Howarth

JBS … we didn’t speak much about expansion. Do I, have I got that wrong, Bob?

Bob Brown

You’ve got it absolutely right. Well, they said they we’re here to listen to us. We said we were here to listen to them. But they had nothing to offer, except to say they would not damage the Tasmanian environment. But when it came to future plans, what their plans are, they had nothing to offer.

Journalist – Laura Beavis

So there was no specifics that they offered in terms of how they wouldn’t damage the environment, how they would be measured, and so on?

Bob Brown

No. They did say they wanted to collaborate with us. We said we’d collaborate on implementing the Dennes Point Declaration.

Christine Milne

JBS did also point out on their global website their commitments to the environment, but I pointed out to them that their reputation preceded them, that the Amazon is still on fire because of the suppliers to their food chain burning literally thousands of hectares of the Amazon. And that action speaks louder than words as far as we’re concerned.

Journalist – unidentified

So Bob Brown has your organisation put JBS on notice?

Bob Brown

Our organisation has put JBS on notice that we’re here to defend Tasmania and its environment. We’re aware of the closure of two meat processing works in Tasmania, which wasn’t in – and we spoke about that – in the interests of at least some of the producers in Tasmania, but we’re aware of this global reputation that JBS has which involves not just environment degradation, but poor treatment of workers in American meatworks. They’ve been fined over that. And of course, allegations of political bribery. So we put JBS on notice that Tasmanians are very, very strong in defending our environment, not least our coastal environment, and they had better take notice

Journalist – unidentified

Any hints of any more interest in other aquaculture projects in Tasmania?

Bob Brown

No, but this corporation is massive. And we’ll be looking at takeovers of the other components of the aquaculture industry, as well as the body politic. They want, they wanted to have a joust with us about politics and the power of the Greens in this state. But I gave him a short questionnaire on mathematics. And it didn’t come too much, as far as they were concerned. They had nothing, not one thing to offer the Tasmanian people in terms of specifically improving the environmental performance of this damaging industry.

Journalist – Laura Beavis

And what’s your general feeling coming out of this meeting? Are you left with more concerns, or…?

Bob Brown

Now the dictate will be coming from overseas, rather than from in Tasmania, and that we don’t expect that things will get better. I mean, we expect that JBS will be giving a full account of who else it’s seeing while it’s in Tasmania. And we, the public has a right to know that, of course, and what its future plans are in Tasmania, but we gave them our future plans, which is the Dennes Point Declaration and say we were happy to work on that. We are not in the business of being sucked into talking with junior operatives in a corporation like this with its reputation. We realise we have a big job defending Tasmania’s environment.

Journalist – unidentified

You didn’t see the chief did you?

Bob Brown

The chief was apparently making a phone call. He’s not the chief anyway, the chief is in Sao Paulo, in Brazil. And we realised that we’re dealing with a very small component of this big corporation, and the officers who run the Australian component of it. But we were here to stand up for Tasmania, against this massive and environmentally-marauding international corporation.

Journalist – Laura Beavis

Who made this vow to protect the environment. Who was it? Who said that they would do that? John Berry?

Bob Brown

Yes, it was. John Barry, the Australian director of the corporation, made that commitment. It was a verbal commitment. Let me explain how that came about. He said that the company was sustainable. I asked him what that meant. There was a bit of hesitation. But I said ‘are you talking about sustainable, economically sustainable, which means something very different than environmentally sustainable’. He then said, ‘now we’re in the business of not damaging the environment’.

Journalist – Laura Beavis

And I suppose what if JBS doesn’t live up to this pledge? As you see it. What will Bob Brown Foundation do?

Bob Brown

Well, it’s a fundamental… just let me, you’ve reminded me, just let me say that we also questioned the role of Huon Aquaculture and the industry in supporting the government’s plan to increase penalties on peaceful environmental protesters, because that not only covers forestry and mining, but it covers the aquaculture industry. We don’t believe that’s coming around by accident. We think that’s lobbying from the aquaculture industry. And the JBS representatives said they believed in the right of people to protest. So we’ll get, we’ll seek clarification on that. Now, back to your question.

Journalist – Laura Beavis

I’m just going to ask if you don’t believe that JBS lives up to this pledge, what will you do?

Bob Brown

Well, Bec Howarth is our officer now looking at campaigning to protect Tasmania’s interests here. We’re going to continue the good work of the environment movement in drawing to the public’s attention the downside of this industry, which has been exemplified by Richard Flanagan’s book, Toxic. But we intend to be much more publicly proactive in taking this industry to task, not least the cruelty to seals, the destruction of seabirds, the threat to rare and endangered species like the handfish.

Rebecca Howarth

We’ve entered with this campaign at this time, because the the community as I said before and the environment have reached a tipping point. Community groups have been asking for change for many, many years now and nothing has happened. Nothing has changed except we have now a huge, ever-growing expansion that is apparent. So we are entering into the space, we’ll be extremely proactive, extremely loud and noisy. We have supporters all over the state ready to get active in this space and protect our coastlines.

Christine Milne

The Tasmanian community really needs to be aware that JBS is one of the biggest meat producers in the world and wants to be selling the the greatest amount of protein of any company in the world. That puts Tasmania on notice actually, that this company wants massive expansion. They didn’t own up to that today. But it is very clear that in their talks with everybody in this state, that is what they want to achieve, and we want to get those pens out of the water. Therein lies the ongoing community consultation and our response to JBS and the failure of compliance and enforcement in Tasmania. They will collaborate with the Tasmanian Government as the aquaculture industry always has in this state to the detriment of the environment. So this is not just a marginal player. This is JBS moving into industrial scale aquaculture. That should give Tasmanians really food for thought.

Journalist – Ruby Cornish

So your main goal is to get fish pens out of the water, how confident are you that this will eventually happen?

Bob Brown

Well, this should happen because that’s where the world is going. And Tasmania is going to be left stranded with world’s worst practice not world’s best practice if we don’t protect our marine ecosystem. I spoke about real estate values being damaged by the aquaculture industry in Tasmania for people who are living around the coastal areas that are affected by the fish farms. Judgement on the real value of the fish farms competing with, for example, Tasmania’s globally famous scenic, including its coastal scenic amenity, and its wildlife amenity, is going to be much stronger in the future. It’s been missing in the past to a great degree, but it’s going to be much stronger in the future

Tasmanian Times

During the state election this year, and since, I haven’t detected a single note of caution from Labor about expansion of fish farms, any support for the Dennes Point Declaration, any enthusiasm for beefing up or reforming the Environmental Protection Authority. Do you think they’re failing to provide the scrutiny that opposition parties traditionally do towards government policies?

Bob Brown

To quote if I may the French president, I don’t think I know. The Labor Party has been trying to outdo the Gutwein Liberal government in fostering the fish farm industry which is now in a major part owned and will be directed from overseas against the interests of people living in coastal Tasmania in particular. And that is a big risk for the government and the Labor opposition, Labor needs to look again at its direction here. And instead of trying to leapfrog the government in being subservient to companies like JBS, to look after the interests of the Tasmanian people who want the pristine waterways – well, where they were pristine – returned to pristine and those that are still pristine protected.

Journalist – Laura Beavis

Can one of you please explain what the Dennes Point Declaration is and who made it? And what it calls for?

Rebecca Howarth

Yeah, the Dennes Point Declaration is a declaration that was established by the Tasmanian Alliance for Marine Protection and all their partners a number of years ago. It is a declaration that they want to see Tasmanian salmon pens out of inshore coastal waters. We want to see an exploration of a move to onshore operations and a truly independent EPA, which is what the government is alluding to we are heading towards, but we are sceptical We can provide you with a copy of the Dennes Point Declaration, all of the participating groups in the alliance around the state have signed on to this declaration.

Journalist – unidentified

I’m guessing you talked about this declaration this morning. Yes? And what was JBS’s response to it?

Rebecca Howarth

They were receptive. They have taken it away with them. We provided them with a copy of it. And they have said that they’re willing to look into it. And we said, we look forward to working with them towards achieving this declaration.

Bob Brown

The new Tasmanian CEO said he had read Toxic. And I understand that they are meeting TAMP this afternoon,

Journalist – Ruby Cornish

Did they give any indication of going on land with fish farms?

Bob Brown

No. None. But they said… they repeatedly came back to wanting to collaborate with us. We’re familiar with this from multinational corporations. And we said yes, we are very looking forward to collaborating with you in implementing the Dennes Point Declaration. Because what we want to see is collaboration on being positive about the future of the industry, in an environmentally protective way, rather than simply this endless discussion about trying to lessen the impact they’re having on seals, dolphins, handfish, and the marine ecosystem that everything including the of course, the shellfish, fish industries that people depend on in Tasmania.

Statement – JBS Australia, 11 November 2021

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JBS Australia CEO Brent Eastwood and senior JBS executives have spent the week in Tasmania visiting Huon’s facilities and meeting some of its 850 employees ahead of JBS officially acquiring the Huon business on the 17^thNovember 2021.

We are thrilled at the positive reception and engagement we’ve had from the Huon team. We look forward to working with them to strengthen the business – supporting a significant number of direct and indirect jobs, export opportunities and economic growth for Tasmania.

The JBS team also met with local environment, political and community stakeholders. In good faith, JBS initiated meetings with the Bob Brown Foundation and TAMP to understand their issues.