Cargill's biotechnology position

Cargill’s overall business goal is to be a global leader in nourishing people by creating distinctive value for those we serve. We believe that agricultural biotechnology is an important tool in achieving that vision.

Biotechnology holds enormous promise and benefits for farmers, the environment and consumers. Guided by this belief, we will continue to work with farmers and our food and feed customers to bring those benefits to market.

Cargill supports science-based safety and environmental regulation of biotechnology and recognizes that consumer preferences and variations in producer use will ultimately determine demand.

Cargill is committed to serving the needs of its food and feed manufacturing customers by supplying them with both approved genetically enhanced grains and oilseeds, and with conventional ingredients and other products that serve their specific consumer or market needs.

Cargill believes its customers and suppliers should be free to choose whether to use agricultural biotechnology products. As a company, we are committed to providing solutions that fit all of our customers’ needs and maximize their ability to create value. Today genetically enhanced and non-enhanced grains and oilseeds are flowing together into the marketplace in the huge volumes that make commodity grain handling such an efficient and low-cost system. However, if opportunities develop to serve premium markets for identity-preserved grains and oilseeds that meet specific customer requirements, we will work with farmers and our customers to realize them. That may include niche markets for non-genetically enhanced grains and oilseeds, which cost more to keep separate from commodity grain flows and today are a small part of the market from origins where genetically enhanced grains and oilseeds are widespread.

As we have since the first genetically enhanced crops were commercialized in 1996, Cargill will continue to accept and market most genetically enhanced crops, conventionally bred crops and specialty grains. Our grain origination businesses will accept genetically enhanced varieties that have been approved for use in major export markets. Cargill’s oilseed processing plants and corn milling plants will accept oilseed and corn varieties, respectively, that have been approved for food and feed use in the country of production and their corresponding major export markets. Our corn wet mills, however, cannot accept varieties that have not yet been approved in all major export destinations, but will work with farmers to channel those crops to a proper destination. Cargill believes the key to continued execution on these commitments is through appropriate communication and dialogue between Cargill and our producer customers.

In response to the emergence of agricultural biotechnology in production agriculture and inclusion of these products in food and feed supply chains, some governments have implemented regulatory frameworks. These frameworks have been implemented with the aim of ensuring that appropriate risk assessment and risk management policies are addressed before genetically enhanced varieties can be used in national food and feed supply chains. These national frameworks have created additional complexity in the global food and feed supply chains.

With the continued globalization of food and feed supply chains, and a commitment to providing producer and consumer choice, Cargill opposes the commercialization of new genetically enhanced products prior to regulatory approvals in major export markets. Commercialization without major market approvals creates significant negative impacts throughout the food chain, potentially disrupting trade, damaging brands and imposing burdensome and costly testing on downstream stakeholders.

Cargill believes that a zero tolerance policy for a low-level or adventitious presence of agricultural biotechnology products authorized in one or more countries but not in the country of import is not a viable risk management approach. The potential for the unintended mixing of impurities within grain, feed and food is well recognized and widely understood in international trade and numerous grain and grain product standards currently exist to account for the incidental low-level presence of unintended materials. It is a commercial reality that low-level presence is likely to occur despite the application of good agricultural and manufacturing practices by operators. Cargill encourages markets to develop risk management policies for low level presence, aligned with international food safety standards such as the Codex Alimentarius, which will enable them to move away from zero tolerance and minimize disruptions in trade.

We remain supportive of agricultural biotechnology as one of the solutions to growing safe, affordable, nutritious and accessible food for the world. With improved approaches to managing agricultural biotechnology in global supply chains, food and feed will be available to meet the demands and choices of producers, processors, food and feed manufacturers, and consumers.