Carrefour apologizes to Brazil for CEO’s remarks, and beef is headed back to its stores

BRASILIA, Brazil — Brazilian beef was headed back to the shelves of Carrefour-owned grocery stores Tuesday after a brief boycott sparked by remarks from the French company’s chief executive about nations in the South America trade bloc Mercosur. Carrefour CEO Alexandre Bompard apologized to Brazil’s Ministry of Agriculture for social media posts in which he said that Mercosur nations had an unfair competitive advantage due to lower environmental and sanitary standards. The Brazilian ministry published his letter on its website Tuesday, along with a statement asserting that the country’s agricultural practices are “of exceptional quality and fully compliant with one of the world’s most stringent environmental legislations.” Atacadao, a Brazilian food warehouse giant owned by Carrefour, said in a statement that it expected beef product restocking to “normalize” in coming days. Brazil’s agribusiness sector also fears that the pending European Union Deforestation Regulation will outlaw the sale of forest-derived products within the EU’s 27-nation bloc if companies can’t prove their goods are not linked to deforestation.