Conflict soy: rainforest is also being cut down for Belgian cheese and hamburgers

The Amazon rainforest is on the verge of disappearing. Hectare by hectare, rainforest gives way to cattle and seas of soy. And that conflict soy ends up on our plates too. This investigative dossier for De Standaard traces the soy bean: from the indigenous Munduruku whose land is being cleared, via the BR-163 soy highway and Cargill's export terminal in Santarém, to feed companies and supermarkets in Belgium.

Ine Renson's series consisted of several parts, of which we handled three. The first follows the deforestation frontline in the Amazon, the second moves to the Cerrado (the Brazilian savanna disappearing even faster) and the third maps the Belgian link. The strength of the dossier lies in its atmosphere: fullscreen drone footage of cleared rainforest, photo carousels of Munduruku villages, satellite imagery showing deforestation year by year, and video sections that immerse the reader in the landscape. That visual impact was made possible by the photo and video work of Marizilda Cruppe.

The first part is still available online, but parts two and three have unfortunately been lost in the digital archive.