Day 286 - 24 Oct 96 - Page 15


     
     1        McDonald's receiving beef in the USA from abroad that is
     2        further backed up by the fact that often we are talking
     3        about the same companies, for example OSI, that crop up all
     4        over the world as suppliers to McDonald's, having export
     5        plants in Brazil supplying OSI.  For example, Glenmark
     6        plant in the USA having their own plant in the USA, a
     7        supplier of McDonald's.  OK, we cannot touch that stuff,
     8        claims McDonald's, because it is imported, but the overlap
     9        is not just a statistical inevitability argument; there is
    10        also the commercial expediency, if you like, argument that
    11        the inter-relationship is so close that only a very
    12        well-policed system is likely to be able to stop that
    13        overlap.  So that is the general point.
    14
    15        Mr. Cesca, on page 27 of day 220, said he had never asked
    16        or investigated if beef had been exported from Brazil to
    17        McDonald's elsewhere, or to McDonald's in the UK.  I think
    18        I have got a reference here, but I am not exactly sure.  He
    19        did comment on the Lord Vestey letter, saying that he did
    20        not know anything about the fattening of cattle and the
    21        movement of cattle to areas to be fattened.  As we have
    22        heard, he had not investigated anything about land disputes
    23        or indigenous people, disputes in the region supplying
    24        McDonald's beef supplies, and it did seem to me that
    25        Mr. Cesca was unaware about a lot of things.  (Pause)
    26
    27        He said on page 52, day 220, that he was not aware that the
    28        Cuiaba Sadia plants had ever supplied McDonald's.  He said,
    29        "I am not aware of that."  It is line 14, when you asked
    30        him about that.  Then this is the point I have noted.  I
    31        asked him on line 90, "So, really, going back before your
    32        time with McDonald's you have not got any information to
    33        give the court really."  Answer, "No, other than what
    34        Roberto Morganti said to us."
    35
    36        Then on page 54, at the top of the page, he admits that the
    37        line about "We couldn't use any ex-rainforest land beef
    38        because they would be subject to a tax when they came
    39        across the frontier", that that only applied to live
    40        cattle.  But, as we have heard, live young cattle is a
    41        substantial part of the whole beef industry; that live
    42        young cattle are brought into the central plains.
    43
    44   MR. JUSTICE BELL:   Yes, but his point was, 'but not across
    45        state borders, because the margins of profit are not large
    46        and the tax would make all the difference'.  That is the
    47        effect of what he said.  I mean, there is no doubt about
    48        where they are slaughtered, is there, it is just where they
    49        come from in order to be slaughtered in these places.  They
    50        are live until they are slaughtered, and he is saying 'For 
    51        better or worse we have to pay that tax if we brought them 
    52        over the state border'. 
    53
    54   MR. MORRIS:   I would submit that he does not really know what
    55        he is talking about, and that seems to me just a line to
    56        try and muddy the water.  He also said that he had never
    57        investigated Bordon's activities.  That is day 64, line 62,
    58        it was only where they owned the Campo Grande processing
    59        plant.  We have heard of Sue Branford's evidence about
    60        Bordon, the point being that things may be going on behind

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