The Rio 2016™ Organising Committee for the Olympic and Paralympic Games (Rio 2016™) and BRF announced on Tuesday that the brands Sadia and Batavo will be official supporters (tier 2) of the Rio de Janeiro Olympic Games in the Packaged Foods and Dairy Products categories, respectively.

The President of Rio 2016™, Carlos Arthur Nuzman, celebrated the agreement: “Sadia and Batavo are brands that have enormous empathy with Brazilian consumers and a history of involvement with sports. The agreement will be an excellent platform to engage the population and strengthen our commitment to athletes and the sports community across the country. These are two brands of immense prestige, and their confidence in our project makes us very pleased and proud”.

José Antonio Fay, President of BRF, added: “This is the first time the Olympic and Paralympic Games will be hosted in Brazil, a moment awaited by all of us, and which we could not stay away from. The brands Sadia and Batavo are perfect to spread the practice of sports throughout the country. Both have the potential to positively impact the lives of Brazilians”.

Sadia has a longstanding engagement with Olympic sports. The brand created the Sadia Family – 24 elite athletes -, and sponsors the Brazilian Confederations of Judo, Gymnastics and Aquatics.

In addition to these sponsorships, the brand holds other initiatives supporting sports with a focus on social inclusion, such as sponsorship of athletes of the Institute Lançar-se para o Futuro, in Rio de Janeiro, which promotes the development of children and youngsters by means of introduction to, and practice of athletics, and the Project Rhythmic Gymnastics of Toledo (PR), created by the brand in 1996 to benefit the community and the daughters of employees of the factory in the city.

“The support to Rio 2016™ is the crowning of the strategy of Sadia sports platform” said José Eduardo Cabral, Vice President of internal markets. “Sport is one of the strategic pillars of the brand, which understands that investing in athletes is a great way to inspire generations and disseminate values. The brand believes in sport as a pleasurable way to lead a healthy and balanced lifestyle,” he adds.

Batavo has always been close to the world of sports, both through sponsorship to the great national passion – football - and through actions to encourage healthy practices, such as support to street racing and academies. But this, surely, is their greatest involvement with sport.

“We realised that all the famous achievements and histories of resilience we see in the Olympics come from one of the greatest human virtues: the pursuit of excellence. And Batavo believes that the only way to get the best out of your physique is giving it what is best through healthy habits,” states Luiz Lissoni, Vice President of Dairy Products and Supply Chain at BRF.

The Rio 2016™ chief executive, Sidney Levy, added: “The involvement of our commercial partners is crucial for the staging of the Games. To sign an agreement with BRF in these two categories demonstrates the growing interest of the private sector in the event. To have Sadia and Batavo as supporters is a major boost to our project”.