Food Giants Hit with Heavy Penalties for Greenwashing: How Much Have Consumers Paid to Be Fooled?

In recent years, a growing number of food companies have begun promoting their emissions-reduction targets and environmental contributions, and food packaging has started to feature terms such as “sustainable”, “recyclable”, “low-carbon” and “climate-friendly”, in an attempt to make consumers believe that simply buying this product can make a small positive contribution to addressing climate change.

But what do these promises actually mean? Have products bearing these labels really reduced greenhouse gas emissions, or is it just marketing?

The two lawsuits against global meat giants have shown us just how simple and crude food companies’ greenwashing tactics can be. From “net-zero emissions” to “climate-smart beef”, to “environmentally friendly” and “recyclable” on packaging, behind the labels may be just another corporate trick to mislead consumers.

When Beef Giants Slap “Climate-Friendly” Labels on Their Own Products

In 2024, the New York State Attorney General’s office and the Environmental Working Group (EWG), a non-profit organisation dedicated to public health and environmental issues, separately brought lawsuits against the global beef giants—Brazil’s JBS and US Tyson Food—over alleged greenwashing, claiming that the two companies had misled consumers by promoting their beef products as “climate-friendly” and “climate-smart”.

Although both giants denied the allegations, the two cases were ultimately settled with the plaintiffs in 2025.

Tyson agreed to withdraw its statement that it would achieve net-zero emissions by 2050, and, until verified by an independent third party, may not claim that its beef products are “climate-friendly” or “climate-smart”, nor use similar marketing claims in the US market. For the next five years, the company must undergo independent third-party audits to ensure that it honours its relevant climate commitments.

JBS, in turn, agreed to change its “net-zero emissions by 2040” from the original “commitment” to a “target” or “vision”; going forward, if it promotes its emissions-reduction measures, it must detail the specific actions. In addition, JBS will pay US$1.1 million to support sustainable agricultural development in New York State.

With so many products making environmental claims, why did New York State go after these two beef giants? The main reason is that beef is one of the foods with the highest greenhouse gas emissions. In particular, industrialised farming and every stage of beef production generate large amounts of greenhouse gas emissions.

Cattle release large amounts of methane during digestion, while manure and feed crop cultivation also generate methane and nitrous oxide. Deforestation for grazing and feed crops releases carbon stored in soil and weakens the land’s carbon-absorption capacity. As a result, every stage of industrialised beef production, from feed to farming to land use, is accompanied by substantial emissions. The greenhouse gas emissions from beef are about 2.5 times those of lamb and 9 times those of fish and chicken.

JBS and Tyson Food together produce around half of the beef in the United States. Tyson Food alone has total greenhouse gas emissions exceeding those of Austria or Greece, with around 85% of them coming from beef production.

It was for this reason that, when Tyson claimed its own beef was “climate-smart” beef and promised to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050, environmental organisations could hardly believe their ears.

In the lawsuit, EWG pointed out that the methane and nitrous oxide Tyson emits in intensive beef production cannot be fully eliminated through existing or foreseeable technology.

At the same time, Tyson has made extensive use of the “climate-smart” label on its beef products, but it has neither specified the precise standards for “climate-smart beef” nor explained how its net-zero target will be achieved.

As a result, the marketing of so-called net-zero emissions and climate-friendly beef is misleading.

The lawyer handling the case, Carrie Apfel, argues that ““climate-smart” does not apply to any industrially farmed beef product. Because beef has the highest carbon emissions of all foods, even if beef carbon emissions were reduced by 10% to 30%, it still could not be called climate-friendly.” She said, “this settlement should send a clear signal to consumers—to be wary of beef producers that tout their own products as “climate-smart”.”

She further pointed out: “At every stage of (industrialised) beef production, large amounts of greenhouse gases are generated. To achieve effective emissions reductions at the scale of this industry, companies must make substantive, fundamental changes—and Tyson clearly has not done so.”

The purpose of these two lawsuits is not merely to push companies to change their business models, but also to challenge the false climate-related claims made by industrialised agriculture. Leila Yow, climate programme lead at the US Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP), explained, “This settlement is a major victory in tackling false climate-related claims from industrialised agriculture.”

Do Food Giants Really Care About the Environment and Climate?

For beef farming companies, extremely high greenhouse gas emissions have become an inescapable issue.

Over the past decade, consumers in Europe and the United States have grown increasingly concerned about the environmental impact of food production, particularly whether meat production causes deforestation, whether it meets animal welfare standards, and how much greenhouse gas it emits.

Tyson also admits in its own climate risk report: “Consumers are willing to pay at least a 24% premium for more environmentally friendly and sustainable products… A growing number of consumers are willing to buy beef and other foods that reduce greenhouse gas emissions.” Therefore, for food companies, if they fail to allay public concerns over climate risks, it could affect future product sales and their market competitiveness.

At the same time, governments in Europe and the United States have also begun tightening regulation of companies’ environmental claims.

In recent years, the EU has successively introduced the Empowering Consumers for the Green Transition Directive and the Green Claims Directive, further curbing corporate greenwashing. Under the latter, when making environmental claims such as “environmentally friendly”, “sustainable” or “climate-friendly”, companies must base them on scientific evidence and have them verified by an independent third party, gradually moving towards unified assessment standards.

Although the United States has not developed a unified regulatory system similar to the EU’s, it has begun requiring companies to assume greater responsibility for disclosing climate risks. The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) adopted a rule on climate-related information disclosure for investors in 2024, requiring listed companies to disclose climate risks, greenhouse gas emissions, and the financial impacts of extreme weather. Although the rule was subsequently rescinded in 2025, the climate pressures facing companies have not disappeared as a result.

Driven by both consumers and regulatory pressure, an increasing number of food giants are racing to announce net-zero carbon emissions targets. For them, net-zero is not necessarily a commitment to the environment, but it is certainly a magic key to entering international markets and an important way to respond to investors and shape brand image.

However, for food giants such as JBS and Tyson, achieving net-zero emissions is a near-impossible challenge.

For intensive beef farming, unless the number of cattle is reduced, it is almost impossible to reduce emissions fundamentally—reducing the number of cattle means lower output and lower profits, which companies are obviously unwilling to accept.

So, compared with genuinely changing production methods in practice, it is actually easier simply to change their marketing rhetoric.

To cater to consumers’ preference for sustainable products, for nearly four and a half years Tyson has continuously promoted on its website, social media and in press releases that it would achieve “net-zero emissions” by 2050 and has described its beef as a “climate-friendly” product.

However, according to the litigation filings, Tyson had done very little that was sufficient to deliver on these commitments and could not provide corresponding evidence to support its promotional claims.

The lawsuit states that, of Tyson’s annual revenue of around US$53 billion, only around US$50 million, less than 0.1% of the company’s total revenue, is spent on emissions-reduction measures, and most of that is used for research. By contrast, the company’s annual advertising spend is about three times the amount spent on emissions-reduction research.

This is also why a growing number of lawsuits targeting greenwashing by food companies have focused on whether companies have actually taken action, and have demanded that they stop misleading environmental marketing and promotion.

What Other Common Greenwashing Tactics Do Food Companies Use?

In addition to putting forward net-zero targets that are all talk and no action, another common greenwashing tactic among food companies is to mislead consumers with various vague terms or concepts that lack a unified standard.

For example, terms such as “natural”, “eco-friendly” and “sustainable” often appear on food packaging, leading consumers to believe that these foods are not only green and healthy, but that buying them also supports a more environmentally friendly and healthier way of producing food.

But what do these terms actually mean?

In many countries, “natural”, “environmentally friendly” and “sustainable” do not have a single, strict legal definition. This gives companies considerable interpretive latitude and makes these terms a grey area for greenwashing.

The United States has seen several related lawsuits. Nature Valley, a health-focused snack brand, has long promoted its products as “natural” and even “100% natural”, but its products actually contain highly processed ingredients such as high-fructose corn syrup and maltodextrin. Nature Valley has also faced a class action lawsuit for allegedly misleading consumers.

This phenomenon is also somewhat similar to the earlier dispute within China over the “zero additives” trademark. For example, Qianhe once registered “Qianhe 0” as a trademark and combined it with the word “added” on product packaging, leading consumers to believe that the soy sauce contained no additives.

Whether registering terms such as “zero additives” and “local pig” as trademarks is illegal has sparked considerable public discussion. Many people believe that food companies are exploiting loopholes in trademark registration, effectively playing word games and misleading consumers.

In addition, “recyclable” is one of the environmental labels most commonly used by food companies. When most consumers see “recyclable” on packaging, they tend to assume that the packaging can be recycled and reused, but few think about what happens afterwards: Can it really be recycled? Where can it be recycled? How is it handled in the subsequent recycling process?

As a result, the US beverage and coffee brand Keurig has faced a class action lawsuit. Keurig’s coffee capsules were clearly labelled “recyclable”, but complaints alleged that most local recycling facilities simply cannot process these multi-layer composite coffee capsules, so they end up either in landfill or contaminating other recyclable materials.

The court accepted this view and ordered Keurig to pay a US$10 million settlement. Subsequently, Keurig changed the “recyclable” label on its packaging to: “Please check whether it can be recycled locally—many areas cannot recycle this coffee capsule.”

These cases also remind us that, when a company claims a product is “sustainable” or “recyclable”, consumers should understand whether there is a complete, genuine and verifiable pathway behind the label before paying for it, rather than simply being misled by the company’s environmental marketing.

 Is Climate-Friendliness Feasible?

Of course it is feasible!

Although “climate-friendly” and “climate-smart” are not currently certifications with clear standards and third-party verification mechanisms, this does not mean that climate-friendly agriculture is absent.

Production methods, emission sources and emissions-reduction pathways are not the same for different crops and foods. As a result, truly climate-friendly agriculture is built on specific crops, regions and production conditions.

In fact, in various regions, people are already practising “climate-friendly” agriculture based on local climate, soil and production conditions.

For example, the Yunnan Sili Ecological Substitution Technology Centre (hereinafter “Sili”) has long been exploring climate-friendly rice cultivation methods.

Rice production is also a major source of agricultural methane emissions. At Sili’s project sites, they use ridges and ditches to keep irrigation water mainly in the ditches, so that rice no longer relies on continuous deep flooding, thereby reducing the likelihood of paddy fields developing anaerobic conditions and producing methane.

Sili is also trying direct single-grain sowing of upland rice, growing traditional older rice varieties from different regions. This dry-field method does not require flooding the fields, and the older varieties’ drought tolerance is well suited to Yunnan’s increasingly evident drought conditions. The two rice-growing methods reduce the likelihood of methane emissions from paddy fields and are seen as a climate-friendly rice-growing model.

Of course, food companies can make their products more climate-friendly by changing their production methods, provided that companies and producers put forward concrete methods, real data and verifiable results so that reductions in emissions actually happen. Rather than first slapping on a “climate-friendly” or “climate-smart” label and then hiding the problem behind an unattainable target.

In fact, truly climate-friendly food is not limited to the field. Transport, processing, consumption and later-stage waste disposal all generate carbon emissions, and so all offer opportunities to reduce them.

For ordinary consumers, if they want to make their food choices “climate-friendly”, it is better to choose ingredients from local smallholders using ecological methods than to take a blind-box gamble among a pile of products in supermarkets and on e-commerce platforms whose production methods are unknown: these fresh ingredients are produced without chemical fertilisers or pesticides, which in itself reduces large amounts of carbon emissions; local consumption also reduces carbon emissions from transport and packaging.

Sometimes, trusting your own common sense is more reliable than blindly believing corporate marketing.

Genuine climate-friendliness is not a label, nor a uniform standard that can be applied to all food production, but something that is continuously practised and verified on the ground. Next time you see “climate-friendly” on food packaging, why not ask one more question: how exactly is it achieving that?

– This is Foodthink’s original article No. 825  –

Unless otherwise noted, images are by the author.

Editor: Tianle

Layout: Minglin

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