Our commitment to the world around us 

We strive to make a difference in the world by continually improving our standards, practices and actions — both internally and within the communities where we live and work. Being a good corporate citizen is ingrained in our culture, and we set high standards of integrity, accountability and responsibility for everything we do.

Our commitment to corporate responsibility is built around five cornerstones:

• Food safety
  Food safety is always our top priority. That’s why we’ve invested more than a billion dollars in state-of-the-art facilities and technology as we pursue our goal of completely eradicating pathogens.
• Animal welfare
  We consider the humane and respectful handling of our animals to be a moral obligation. In fact, we were the first major beef supplier to use 24-hour video monitoring by a third-party auditor to validate compliance with animal handling standards.
• Energy and environmental practices
  Protecting and preserving our environment is critical, and we are constantly developing new ways to reduce our environmental impact and preserve our natural resources. For example, we’ve reduced fossil fuel demands by 30 percent through the utilization of biogas from wastewater treatment systems.
• Community involvement
  Corporate citizenship lies at the heart of our business, allowing us to reach out to the communities we serve. Employee-led Cargill Cares councils contribute millions of dollars and thousands of volunteer hours to local nonprofit and charitable organizations each year.
• People practices
  We are committed to treating people with dignity and respect. We believe that hiring, motivating, developing and retaining the right people is critical to our ability to deepen relationships with customers and take a leadership role in environmental and energy conservation, animal welfare and food safety.