GREELEY — Pilgrim’s Pride Corp. (Nasdaq: PPC) is offering $500 million in 10-year unsecured notes to qualified institutional buyers, according to documents filed Wednesday with the federal Securities and Exchange Commission.

In a media statement issued Wednesday, the company said it intends to apply $350 million of the sale’s proceeds toward debt payments, with the balance to be used for “general corporate purposes.”

The Greeley-based chicken processor employs about 35,500 people and operates chicken processing plants and prepared-foods facilities in 12 states, Puerto Rico and Mexico. Its primary distribution is through retailers and food-service distributors. Brazilian meatpacker JBS S.A. (Bovespa: JBSS3) owns 75 percent of Pilgrim’s Pride shares. JBS, which also operates a beef processing plant in Greeley, absorbed Pilgrim’s Pride in 2010 after it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in January 2009 during the economic recession.

Shares of Pilgrim’s Pride were selling for $28.20 at midday after opening 41 cents higher, Last month, the company issued a special $5.77-per-share cash dividend totaling $1.5 billion to shareholders of record as of Jan. 30. The company issued the dividend following improvements in its capital structure.