Cotton Partnerships, Collaboration, and Certifications
Promoting best practices and expanding market access across the cotton industry
We work alongside industry partners and associations – including Cotton Council International, the U.S.-based National Cotton Council, the International Cotton Advisory Committee and the organizations listed below – to promote sustainable production and advance solutions that benefit people across the entire cotton supply chain.
Better Cotton Initiative (BCI)
We are a member of the Better Cotton Initiative (BCI), a multi-stakeholder undertaking to make global cotton production function better for the people who produce the crop, lessen environmental impacts where it is grown and improve the sector’s overall sustainability. Cargill is now one of the largest traders globally of BCI-licensed cotton.
Cotton Made in Africa (CiMA)
Cotton Made in Africa (CMiA) was established within the framework of the Competitive African Cotton Initiative (COMPACI) with the Deutsche Investitions- und Entwicklungsgesellschaft (DEG) and the German International Cooperation (GIZ) as close cooperation partners. The Competitive African Cotton Initiative (COMPACI) was founded in 2005 by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) and the Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). The initiative aims to improve the livelihoods of cotton smallholders in Africa by providing consumers worldwide with a socially and environmentally responsible brand (“Cotton Made in Africa”) that they can support. In 2011, Cargill became a verified CMiA partner and has been part of COMPACI since 2009.
Field to Market®: The Alliance for Sustainable Agriculture
We are members of Field to Market®: The Alliance for Sustainable Agriculture, which convenes stakeholders across agricultural and food supply chains with the aim of developing practical tools that growers can use to assess the efficiency of their operations and make informed resource management decisions. Cotton is one of the key crops for Field to Market as it seeks to champion solutions to make food, fiber and fuel accessible, safe and sustainable into the future.
Cotton LEADS
Cargill is a member of the Cotton LEADS™ program, which is committed to responsibly produced cotton in Australia and the U.S. Built upon core principles of sustainability, best practices and supply chain traceability, Cotton LEADS offers cotton users the confidence their raw materials were produced responsibly.
Cotton as natural capital
In 2016, Cargill was one of seven leading global businesses in the cotton industry to accelerate action on natural capital to ensure a sustainable future for the sector. They joined forces with social and environmental initiatives and cotton experts to produce a report that demonstrates the positive natural capital impacts of specific cotton production practices.
The report "Threading natural capital into cotton: Doing business with nature," was published by the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL), and outlines the actions needed to ensure positive impacts on natural capital. It presents 15 different management interventions in the cotton supply chain, focusing particularly on water, biodiversity and soil.