Climate Change

Our food system is resilient. But the challenges of producing food for a growing population are heightened in the face of a changing climate. We encourage measures to help agriculture adapt to a changing climate while seeking to mitigate agriculture’s environmental impact.

Our commitments

Since 2000, we’ve been working to reduce our company’s direct climate impact. In 2015, we set new targets for 2020 to reduce greenhouse gas intensity, improve energy efficiency and increase renewables as a part of our portfolio.

• Greenhouse gas intensity: Our goal is to reduce by 5 percent against a fiscal 2015 baseline. In fiscal year 2016, we achieved a 2.2 percent reduction.
• Energy efficiency: Our goal is to improve by 5 percent against a fiscal 2015 baseline. We achieved a 1.5 percent improvement in fiscal year 2016.
• Renewable energy: Our goal is to increase renewables to 18 percent of our energy portfolio. Today, 14 percent of our energy needs are met by renewables.

Our actions

We are working to reduce emissions across our supply chains and increase awareness of the risk climate change poses to the business of agriculture, to farmer livelihoods and to food security in the years ahead. Our actions include:

• Food Chain Reaction: Cargill, World Wildlife Fund, Mars and the Center for American Progress developed Food Chain Reaction, a simulation to stress-test the impact of climate change on the global food system.
• Risky Business: We participate in Risky Business, a project in the United States to develop sound economic risk assessments to respond to the impacts of a changing climate.
• Supply chain emissions: We are in the early stages of mapping supply chain emissions as a necessary next step in reducing GHGs from field to fork.

American Business Act on Climate Pledge

In July 2015, Cargill joined with other U.S. businesses at the White House in Washington, D.C., to reaffirm our commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions in our own operations and in our supply chains – and partnering with farmers to help agriculture adapt to a changing climate. We also voiced our support for the U.S. government to play a role in enacting the Paris Agreement. Cargill is contributing in many ways to the goals of the Agreement.

Partnering with farmers

The challenges of producing enough food for a growing, more prosperous global population are heightened in the face of a changing climate. We partner with farmers to help them adapt. We also advocate for continued investment in agriculture to provide farmers with the resources they need to address climate change.

Further investment is needed in the areas of biosciences, agronomics and best practices in sustainable agriculture. We believe our food system is resilient. Working together, we can help our agricultural system evolve to match our changing climate while mitigating the environmental impact.