Addressing climate change

 

We share our expertise with customers and suppliers to understand and help mitigate the environmental and social impact of their operations and supply chains. 

• Developing energy savings knowledge. We have developed several proprietary libraries of knowledge and formed a business Cargill Process Optimizers (CPO) – to take knowledge learned through energy savings at our own plants to key customers. Our customers are then able to capture similar value in their own operations. Customers save up to 15 percent on energy use and see up to a 25 percent reduction in water use after working with CPO, and increase capacity up to 10 percent.
• Generating greenhouse gas (GHG) emission credits. We have developed 13 projects that will generate an estimated 800,000 GHG emission credits by 2012. Examples include building and operating anaerobic digesters - one on a South African pig farm and two on large U.S. dairy farms. One dairy digester is converting manure from the farm’s 6,000 cows into enough electricity to power approximately 1,100 U.S. homes per month and the other U.S. digester on a 10,000-cow dairy farm is expected to produce enough electricity to power approximately 1,400 U.S. homes. Both generate carbon credits from reduced methane emissions in the atmosphere.
• Sharing innovative farming techniques. We partner with Sara Lee to create their  Eco-Grain™ wheat for use in their EarthGrains® bread. Eco-Grain™ wheat is grown using innovative farming techniques that benefit the environment due to the techniques promoting more sustainable agricultural practices. Horizon Milling, a joint venture of Cargill and CHS, Inc., employs the technique with a small group of U.S. family farmers by using satellite imagery and soil samples to apply nutrients to crops with great precision and only where needed. The technique uses less fertilizer and energy; and reduces emissions – while increasing the amount of wheat grown on the land. 
• Training farmers. We partner with The Nature Conservancy (TNC) to train Brazilian soy farmers to comply with the Brazilian Forest Code. The code specifies how much land must be preserved as natural vegetation. By training farmers to comply with the Brazilian Forest Code through reforestation techniques, areas of farmland are restored and permanently protected and local suppliers fulfill their legal obligations to the code. We now purchase soy only from farmers who are participating in the program or working towards compliance to the code.