Chinese beef traders on Wednesday began a landmark agreement to purchase beef from Brazil that is certified to have been raised without illegal clearing of forests, the first such arrangement for the South American country’s beef industry.
The Beef on Track certification is the first of its kind for Brazilian beef, according to Imaflora, the agriculture and conservation group that provides the certification. China is Brazil’s main trading partner and the largest importer of Brazilian beef.
The system rates Brazil’s beef supply chains across four tiers, verifying if they are free of illegal deforestation, activity in protected or Indigenous areas and slave-like labor.
In 2025, more than half of Brazil’s beef exports — 3.1 million tons worth $8.8 billion — went to China, according to Brazilian government data.
The Tianjin Meat Association, which represents major Chinese meat importers and committed to adopt the certification system in October, has initially committed to purchase at least 50,000 tons of certified beef this year.
The certification gives Chinese buyers assurance that the beef they import does not come from land cleared illegally in the Amazon and other biomes, an issue that has drawn increasing attention from global consumers and regulators.