Improving livelihoods while reducing environmental impact in India

In the central India state of Madhya Pradesh, Kellogg and TechnoServe partnered on a two-and-a-half year, three-phase program to help smallholder farmers improve their livelihoods and resilience to climate change. More than 12,000 farmers received training on three key aspects of climate-smart agriculture: farm productivity, farm resilience and impact of the farm on the environment. Sixty-four percent of the farmers were men who received agronomy training and 36 percent were women who received training in organic kitchen gardening.

Over the course of the project, farmers adopted best practices including soil testing, seed germination and use of organic fertilizers that reduced their cost of operations and increased productivity. Sustainable farm revenue increased by more than 20 percent in the first two phases and by more than 40 percent in the third phase of the project.

The organic kitchen gardens continue to improve the overall nutrition of Madhya Pradesh, with 97 percent of families now consuming vegetables at least twice a day. One-third of the female farmers also started earning extra income by selling their surplus organic vegetables.

The project also promoted collective marketing through Farmer Producer Companies (FPC) formed by farmers that share profits and benefits among the membership. By building the capacity of local farmers, the FPCs are now well-run, sustainable operations with established, value-added supply chains for their wheat, maize, chickpea, soybean and jaggery crops. In less than three years, the program created more than USD$4.7 million in incremental, replicable financial benefit to the more than 12,000 participating farmers.

Introducing sustainable practices in Mexico

In Mexico, Kellogg’s Corn Flakes® and Kellogg’s Zucaritas® cereals are best-selling favorites. To make these popular maize-based foods more environmentally sustainable, Kellogg Latin America continues to partner with the Centro Internacional de Mejoramiento de Maiz y Trigo (the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center) and agricultural services company Grupo SACSA to train farm advisors who help small- and medium-sized farmers increase their yields while also sustainably growing the yellow maize used by Kellogg in Mexico. In 2018, this initiative reached more than 270 growers farming 3,736 hectares.

Improving soil health and biodiversity

Our commitment to nurturing our planet starts in the field, with the farmers who grow our ingredients. However, there is another integral component to this equation – the health of the soil where our ingredients are grown. By improving soil health, we also improve water quality, increase drought resistance and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. For this reason, Kellogg has a number of projects around the world devoted to addressing soil health.

Most recently we partnered with the Spain-based Institute of Agri-food Research and Technology (IRTA) on a study on measures to increase biodiversity in the rice growing area of Delta Del Ebro, thus increasing the sustainability of rice farming in the region.

All told, Kellogg soil health projects around the world are advancing best practices across more than 176,000 hectares.

Nurturing our planet through purpose-driven brands

Like our company, many people also care about where their food comes from and how it’s grown and made. In 2018, several Kellogg brands launched efforts that either helped nurture our planet or better connect people to our foods.

• In Europe, boxes of Kellogg’s Corn Flakes® featured its first-ever “Made with Responsibly Sourced Corn” on-pack message, following a thorough third-party audit of the brand’s supply chain to ensure that it complies with environmental, social and governance criteria in partnership with a pilot program with DACSA Group, a leading European miller. In the U.S., in partnership with The Nature Conservancy, Kellogg is providing sustainable agriculture support to the farmers in parts of the country where ingredients are grown for many of our cereals. In early 2019, Kellogg’s Raisin Bran® and Kellogg’s Frosted Mini-Wheats® began featuring on-pack information about the partnership in stores nationwide.
• Also in the U.S., a successful joint retail promotion with Walmart and members of the Midwest Row Crop Collaborative, including Kellogg’s Frosted Mini-Wheats®, supported FFA’s work teaching conservation to the next generation of farmers in Illinois, Iowa and Nebraska. Specially marked in-store displays were featured in 240 Walmart stores to drive awareness of the program.
• In Australia, boxes of Kellogg’s Corn Flakes® proudly bear the message “Australian Made with Aussie Corn,“ a first step in educating people about where their food comes from and how Kellogg partners with farmers where we make and sell our foods.