A web of front people conceals environmental offenders in the Amazon
BUJARI, Brazil — “This one is famous!” the attendant at a farm equipment store in the town of Bujari exclaimed when asked about José Carlos Bronca. The name is also familiar to the man working at a small barbecue restaurant and to a farmer with half a dozen head of cattle on his property at the margins of the federal road connecting Bujari to Rio Branco, the capital of Brazil’s Acre state. “This is a big farmer,” he said, mentioning Bronca’s ranch on the outskirts of town.
Bronca, who was a sponsor of Bujari’s agribusiness fair, Expo Bujari, and has been decorated as a Rio Branco citizen by the City Council, also co-owns the slaughterhouse chain Frigonosso, which has facilities in the states of Acre, Amazonas, Rondônia, São Paulo and Mato Grosso.
The entrepreneur is 71 years old, tall, with black hair diligently combed back. Bronca likes to share photos on Instagram of his holidays in Aruba and his meetings with important politicians, where he’s always dressed with “flair and elegance,” as he puts it. During the administration of Jair Bolsonaro, from 2019 to 2022, Bronca’s visits to Brazil’s capital, Brasília, became especially busy, with meetings with authorities and entities like the then-secretary of land issues, Nabhan Garcia, and the Brazilian National Confederation of Industry. He also took part in a video conference with the then-minister of agriculture, Tereza Cristina.
