Keesa Schreane: Hello, and thank you for joining the Climate Money Work podcast. I'm Keesa Schreane, and today we have with us Mary Jane Melendez, who is the Chief Sustainability Officer with General Mills. Mary Jane, thank you so much for joining us.

Mary Jane Melendez: Thank you for having me here today.

Keesa Schreane: So, I'm going to jump right into it and start off with some of the financials.

A recent Yahoo! finance report stated that over the last half-decade or so, General Mills has grown its earnings per share at about 3.7 percent a year. So citing this holistic view may ease concerns that some stakeholders/ shareholders may have seen with a share price drop of 12 percent last quarter, but clearly, they are primarily positive views and positive feelings around these earnings. In the context of that, we'd love to start off with the conversations that you might be having with investors and other stakeholders. What are the risks and opportunities you're discussing in developing a sustainability strategy in the CPG industry that can continue to have these types of earnings and good success?

Mary Jane Melendez: I'm going to start with the risk side. So we are a company that depends completely on the health and well-being of Mother Nature to be in business. She is our most important supplier, and if we don't act to help get this planet back on a trajectory of health, we will not be in business for another 155 years.

So there's more risk in not acting today, given our role in our proximity to agriculture. That is the foundation of our business. At the same time, I think there are incredible opportunities in the CPG industry, especially as you think about food. We have the opportunity to help drive resilience for people, our planet, our communities, and our businesses.

This is something, again, where we are absolutely connected. We need to ensure that we have plans in place to help mitigate climate change and to ensure that we are building long-term business resilience as a company that is taking the outputs of Mother Nature, like oats wheat, and dairy, and then transforming them into great tasting products that are marketed and sold in more than a hundred countries around the world.

So, I think it's a really exciting space to be in as we think about planetary challenges ahead of us. We have not only the opportunity, but I think the great responsibility to act in ways that will help advance planetary health.

Keesa Schreane: Speaking of that, going right into the agricultural piece is so very important for you.

There was a recent sustainable brands article where, Jay Watson, your Director of Regenerative Agriculture mentioned two specific areas related to regenerative agriculture that are very important. Number one, investing in the farmer-led movement to help farmers be successful, and number two, measuring outcomes and impact in the field at the farm, you know, with the landscape.

So with that said, talk us through how regenerative farming is making a difference from that mother nature as our key supply chain, key supplier perspective from diversity, biodiversity as well as social engagement. We've talked before about the educational component, but then there's a climate and environment component.

What do you see in terms of that?

Mary Jane Melendez: For me, I believe that the regenerative agriculture space is one of the most promising areas that can help advance planetary health. I'll give you a bit of context here. Back in 2019, General Mills was one of the first companies to set a commitment, and that is to advance regenerative agriculture across 1 million acres of farmland by 2030.

For General Mills, that number is significant. It represents between 25 to 30 percent of the acreage it takes to source key ingredients for our products. I'm super proud of the work that Jay and his team have done in this space. We are actually ahead of our goal. Today, we are advancing regenerative agriculture on more than 500,000 acres.

The outcomes that we are starting to see on the farms are promising. I'll give you a few examples. So we are looking at outcomes related to increased biodiversity, so more life in the soil, more life above ground. That could be things like more earthworms, more bugs, more beetles, more birds. On the farm, it's been really incredible to see the difference in terms of the amount of life that's on a regenerative farm versus maybe sitting on a conventionally managed acre right next to that. We are also looking at farmer profitability. Just Monday, we took a number of our investors out to a regenerative farm in Redwood Falls, Minnesota. So we took a two-hour bus ride. The first time we've ever had investors out on a farm, and we drove to Redwood Falls, Minnesota. It's called Stony Creek Farms. It was so incredibly powerful to be able to stand in the field and see a regeneratively managed acre that had living roots in the ground, so much plant and crop diversity, the number of bugs, and just the pure life that was on that acre.

Shane was one of the farmers, and he's with Understanding Ag. This is one of the groups we engage in to help bring training education and assistance to our farmers as they're making the change to regenerative agriculture. Shane had a tool that measured the temperature of the ground and he took a temperature measurement of the bare soil, which was 104 degrees, and then measured the soil that was covered by all of these different cover crops with the living roots, and it was 68 degrees.

The look on people's faces when they saw that temperature difference in that regenerative acre was astounding, and I think the light bulb went off for folks in terms of what agriculture can do to help drive planetary resilience, to help address global warming, soil erosion, the broken water cycles, broken nutrient cycles that we're facing today, and think differently about how we might feed future generations in a way that is more in harmony with the natural intelligence of this planet.

It was just incredibly powerful to see that, and at General Mills, we have been working with farmers who are in our supply sheds. Those are large areas where we are sourcing key ingredients that we buy a significant amount of, including wheat, oats, and dairy.

Those are ingredients that have higher greenhouse gas intensity levels. We buy a lot of those ingredients for our products like Cheerios, Nature Valley, and Haagen Dazs ice cream, and what we have learned is that these farmers are starting to see different outcomes on their farm ecosystem, whether it's eagles returning to the land for the first time since these farmers were very, very young, or seeing more bugs come back onto their land, or we were talking about this in Minnesota, there's a lot of aphids coming out right now, and rather than spraying for aphids, what they do is they wait for these, I think they were called Japanese lady beetles that come in and actually feed on, they're a predator for these beetles, so there are these natural nutrient cycles that they see on their land as they're really kind of paying attention to the power of Mother Nature.

I think that for General Mills, what I really appreciate about the approach that this company is taking is that it's really a farmer-led, principles-based approach. These principles are global, and they really work to restore ecosystems and communities that are absolutely critical to our business.

So together with our on-the-ground partners, we both launch or expand programs that offer or invite farmers in for training, one-on-one coaching. We promote peer-to-peer learning and community building. It was also very powerful on Monday with investors to see this farmer, this regenerative agriculture farmer, take a shovel and scoop out a big section of his soil, and it was like moist, beautiful chocolate cake with earthworms and aggregates, and root systems. Next door on the neighboring, conventionally managed farm, which didn't have the regenerative agriculture principles applied, it was drier, it was warmer, and it just wasn't teeming with life like that regenerative acre was, so it's been really powerful to see these examples come to life and also for farmers to learn from other farmers.

We are not the experts in this area.

Keesa Schreane: So that's amazing. You're talking about educating farmers, but also, Mary Jane, there's a difference between having a quarterly call with your institutional investors, and shareholders on the call versus getting into a bus, and taking a field trip into the farm.

What has been the feedback from investors who have participated? It's one thing, as I said, to have a conversation, it's another thing for them to actually see it. What have investors said? What led up to this? Was there some investor conversation that led up to that? And if so, what happened afterward?

Take us into those conversations.

Mary Jane Melendez: Absolutely. It was a great story. So General Mills happened to be a guest on one of the investor's ESG day events, and we talked about the work that the company is leading in regenerative agriculture, and we talked about the number of acres that are advancing, what we're learning, what are some of the challenges, and what are the future opportunities as we work to enroll a million acres in our programs.

We were sharing things that have worked, where farmers are seeing pressure, or where they have societal pressure to not make changes and to continue with the way they're currently farming. So we had a very robust conversation about regenerative agriculture, and at the very end I said, and while this is great to talk about it, and it's great that I have this, you know, really pretty visual, there's something magical that happens on the farm when you can hear the life, see the life, smell the soil, and it's a different experience that I believe so powerfully connects your head and your heart, and just gives you a completely different understanding and deep appreciation for what these farmers are doing on their ecosystems to help heal our planet.

They are amazing heroes who are both helping to feed as well as heal the planet. It's just remarkable, and so at the end, I said, If you ever want to come from Wall Street to Redwood Falls, Minnesota, we would be happy to host you, and I didn't actually think that they would take us up on that because they have very busy days, they have demanding jobs, and lo and behold, we ended up having, I think it was eight different investment firms represented on Monday morning, and we picked them up at their hotel at 10 a.m., and spent two hours on the bus and for the full two hours, Keesa, Jay Watson on our team that Director of Regenerative Agriculture didn't get to eat lunch on the bus. He had to stand and answer questions because they were so engaged. They had become Prepared. They had done pre-reads that we had shared with them. We shared with them a couple of resources like Kiss the Ground, which is a movie that's on Netflix, or Biggest Little Farm, to help them get a better sense of what we meant by regenerative agriculture and the potential outcomes that it can drive on the farm ecosystem.

I have to say, I was so pleased by the level of engagement, and by the fact that they did their homework. They read these articles, and they came prepared with questions, and this deep curiosity to want to better understand this potential, and not only why General Mills is doing this, but why several other food companies and CPGs have set very similar commitments in the regenerative agriculture space.

It was just delightful to see them, again, as that shovel full of healthy soil was held out in front of them, they got to touch aggregates, or they got to see a soil health demonstration where there are four different types of soils. Some of it is just dirt that had, you know, dirt from maybe a garden and then there was forestry, there was a little plot from a conventionally managed farm, and then a regeneratively managed farm. They simulated a rainstorm, and the runoff from the regeneratively managed farm was almost zero because that soil was so healthy, it had greater water holding capacity than other areas where, you know, dirt that would maybe be closer to where we are, over-tilled, overmanaged. All the runoff that came through in that fact that the water actually could not penetrate the soil. It just ran off and took a lot of the soil with it. It again helps you understand these concepts in such a powerful way when you can see what's actually happening to these natural ecosystems, and the soil and health and water piece.

Keesa Schreane: So we’re talking about innovation within the agricultural area. Let's talk about the other types of innovative approaches that you all have taken in the past. You mentioned that this started in 2019 with the regenerative agriculture. I know in 2021 you all began some innovative approaches to financial structuring to exhibit your commitment to sustainability.

In April 2021 you had the First U.S.C. P.G. company to have a sustainability-linked credit facility, which means you receive a pricing adjustment based on measuring progress and reducing greenhouse gases as well as using renewable energy. In October of the same year, there was a sustainability-linked bond making you all the first U.S. investment-grade consumer packaged goods company to execute this type of green financing bond. So we have the innovation at the agricultural level and we also have the innovation at the financial level. Four years in from the 2019 region of agriculture, agriculture date and two years into the financial structure.

What are some current innovations, themes, and trends that your leadership team is engaging with now to improve on these sustainability efforts? Are you still really focused on farming? Are you focused more on the financial structuring? What's on the agenda today?

Mary Jane Melendez: There are three big areas of focus, and I would say that these are our three priority commitment areas where we are investing, resourcing, building capabilities, and putting people in place to ensure that we are seeing progress. Those are the reduction of our greenhouse gas emissions. So we have a commitment today to reduce our emissions by 30 percent across our full value chain by 2030. That's the first area and I'm happy to talk a little bit more about some of the work that's happening within that space.

The second priority area is around regenerative agriculture. Again, we're 500, 000 acres into a 1 million acre commitment and very, very excited to continue to see that progress and the momentum really building there. The third area is around packaging and there's a lot of really exciting innovation happening in the packaging space.

I'm very, very proud of the work that the company has done up to this point. We have 92 percent of our packaging in North America and our food service business that is already recyclable or reusable, and that is something to be proud of when you think about the number of brands in that portfolio that already have recyclable materials and recyclable packaging.

I think what I have learned in this role is that the last 10 percent of any public commitment, can be a challenge. Low-hanging fruit is gone. The easy wins are gone. Now it comes to getting really creative. Engaging very, very smart people with technical expertise who are on the leading edge of things that maybe don't exist today, but there are promising pilots and promising new innovations that are developing. I am very, very grateful that we have an outstanding research and development team here at General Mills. We call them ITQ or innovation, technology, and quality, and these are some of the most brilliant people I've ever come across in my career, and they are helping the company to lead in packaging innovation.

So that last 8 percent that we need to get to fully recyclable. They are partnering with suppliers with new packaging companies. Testing new materials that you would not have thought about before. I read some things, you know, I follow the packaging space very, very closely just given that we have a major commitment in this area, and I'm seeing things like students developing packaging that is made out of fish gills that are now recyclable. I mean it's just, it's amazing to see the innovation and the creativity coming out of this space. I think when Human beings are presented with really, really big challenges, but if we overcome them, we have the opportunity to drive such positive and lasting impact.

There's creativity that just pours out in such different ways, and the collaboration across these teams, whether they are brand teams trying to solve a consumer challenge or the packaging team is trying to really figure out how do we reduce the amount of plastic, or even the amount of packaging overall. The creativity that comes through these cross-collaborative groups is just very very inspiring.

So while that last 8 percent is not going to be easy for sure I have no doubt that the right people are on it and that we will get there over time, I think the biggest thing that we need right now is the time to continue to innovate, to test, to learn, to understand what doesn't work, and when we fail fast, let's fail fast. Let's learn, let's pivot, and let's go on to the next piece.

Keesa Schreane: So in terms of, I get the last 10 percent being a challenge and that time is really critical. What about questions about cost? You get a lot of issues with, we'd love to do this, but the cost, the investment dollars, that's just a challenge to get.

Is that an issue? Or do you think that that's not as much of an issue as the time piece?

Mary Jane Melendez: I think for us and from our perspective because we've made these big, ambitious commitments and our, our leaders are holding our feet to the fire on these things, it's not so much the cost piece because over time they will figure out how to do holistic margin management and it won't affect the P& L.

Yes, there are investors in upfront investments, but it is more of the time. We can have the financial resources and we're ready to go, and then we run a pilot and we find that particular material actually isn't holding up the food safety standards that we need, so let's go back to the drawing board.

How do we reinvest? How do we re-scope the project to make sure that Next time we come back to test we can see progress within that particular area?

Keesa Schreane: So in talking about some of the standards that you need to meet, we all know that CPG, it touches a lot of places. In your sustainability report, you talk about where you want to have a footprint, whether that's transparency and nutrition food security, or even employee safety, all while generating revenue.

So how do you integrate some of those core elements of sustainability into your firm's overall strategy while driving revenue?

Mary Jane Melendez: It's a great question and what I would point to is a very thoughtful enterprise integration strategy. So this does not happen by accident. We start with The governing body and having the right governance structure in place.

So here at General Mills, we have a committee called the Global Impact Governance Committee, shorthand, we call it the GIGC. It is chaired by our CEO and most of his direct reports, including our chief strategy and growth officer, our chief financial officer, our head of our North American business, and our head of our pet business, all sit at that table and they are the ones who are responsible for driving commitment advancement. It no longer rests on the sustainability or global impact team because those leaders are the ones with the decision-making authority on where to put investments, how fast or how slow will go, and to resolve business tensions when there are those when you get okay, I need to prioritize a plant trial versus keep running the plant.

There are those tensions that come up all the time, but if they know there's an enterprise goal, there's an enterprise goal for you. With the amount of progress that needs to happen in a given fiscal year, those leaders help drive accountability within their own organizations to ensure that we are keeping pace with our overall commitment glide path.

So I would say number one, it absolutely starts with the governance structure. The second piece is understanding what work needs to happen in what parts of the organization in order to drive progress. One of the biggest changes that we had in our last fiscal year was we developed our greenhouse gas reduction plan, and as we got clarity on the jobs to be done, we changed how we organized within the sourcing organization. We've hired an additional headcount there who are now solely responsible for advancing the sustainability greenhouse gas reduction goal, they are responsible for supplier engagement, and they're collecting supplier greenhouse gas data. That didn't exist a few years ago, but as we got the clarity of where the work needed to happen in order to make progress and brought that forward to our leaders, they signed off on approval, gave us the resourcing, the headcount to understand unless sourcing is engaged here, we will not make progress in this area, or unless the global energy team is here and knows the pace at which we need to be advancing to renewable electricity or renewable energies, the sustainability team can't do that.

We are not the ones buying the energy. So there's been this clear understanding of who needs to do what and when which has made this process so much smoother. It's not without its challenges, for sure. These business teams are under a lot of pressure. There are very, very high expectations to drive the P& L, to drive innovation goals, to drive cost savings, to drive sustainability, and within their jobs, they are figuring out how to manage all of these things and balance those challenges. When there are trade-offs or risks are made, they are elevated through up to that governance committee, which has been just a great backstop and ensuring progress in these areas. So that integration piece has been absolutely key.

One of the other things that we have done is we've highlighted the key functions that play significant roles in advancing these commitments. It's not everybody in the company that jobs are changing. It's sourcing, it's our innovation technology and quality group, it's manufacturing, it's our brand teams, and it's our business segment. So there are seven key areas within General Mills that have what are called integration champions. So they are kind of like a hub and spoke. Our team is at the center and they are the connectivity. Into each of those business units or into each of those segments to clearly architect the road map by fiscal year of what work needs to be done.

How are we measuring? How do we ensure it's in the scorecard? How do we know we're getting the right data? And how do we know that we're elevating on time any risks that might put us off the annual plan? So it's been, it's been a very significant transformation at General Mills, and we would not be able to make progress unless we were at the same time advancing integration.

Keesa Schreane: I love that you mentioned the hub and said that you're at the center of things. I'm wondering in terms of the sustainability function long term, do you think that overall as an industry having CSOs, having sustainability officers? Is that sustainable? Or do you see a total integration of the sustainability function once we get to where we need to be?

Do you see that being integrated into the business, or do you always see there being a separate sustainability function after 2030, 2050 when many of these firms have met the goals that they want to achieve?

Mary Jane Melendez: Personally, we are working to try to put ourselves out of a job because when this is fully integrated and done right across the company, it's just within the way that you operate.

Are we there yet? No, we still have a lot of work to do, but I hope at some point within my lifetime that there is no need for a separate team because it is integrated into every single aspect of the business. It's integrated at the board level. It's integrated with how you recruit employees. It's integrated into how you tell your responsibility story. It's integrated into financial planning, and maybe there will still be some type of center team providing support, but over time, I feel like we should have a family of 38, 000 General Mills champions helping to advance this work integrated as part of their day job and there will be hopefully this need for sustainability officers because we have figured out a way to operate in harmony with Mother Nature within planetary boundaries and still be able to feed a growing global population sustainably.

Keesa Schreane: As you know, right now, there is, particularly in the U. S., there's a lot of discussion around possible ESG policies as it relates to ESG being a part of investment decisions that investors consider ESG risks. So, with that said, what do you think are the most valued aspects of sustainability in the C.P.G. Industry? And what are the most undervalued aspects of sustainability in the C. P. G. Industry?

Mary Jane Melendez: Some of the most valued opportunities are the fact that we don't have companies, you know, you have a collection of CPG companies that have made regenerative agriculture commitments, so there's something here.

I think there is a lot of value when you get large companies that have scale, that have investment, that can put resources into a movement. There is such power in that work, and I think if we can figure out as companies, how we work together pre-competitively to contribute to those shared landscapes that we all care about and maybe worry about in the future, less about attribution or getting credit for what General Mills is doing or what my own company is doing.

We all share this planet. We can, I think if we can get our minds around ways to think about credit and collaboration there. There is a value in there that we have not fully realized yet. I think there's a desire. I think companies want to do the right thing. They want to work together. It's harder to actualize that desire on a farmscape.

I think if we can't make that change, I think we will isolate and perhaps frustrate farmers. If you have all of these companies and organizations going in and they've got 25 different programs to opt into, we're just gonna overwhelm them. They've got huge jobs to do, and we need to figure out how we, as an industry, and even more broadly, civil society, and government, come together to do this in a way that will drive true, lasting impact effectively and efficiently.

So we've got, I think we have some work to do there, honestly, but I think that we can get there because I think that not only does the world need us to do this. People have very ambitious goals right now, and from what I can see, I think we need to act with a little bit more urgency than we are today.

Keesa Schreane: You really laid out some really great stories around how General Mills has engaged investors, and in a very nontraditional way with the field trip, you've laid out stories around how General Mills is engaging farmers. So if you look at the entire stakeholder ecosystem, what does stakeholder engagement success around sustainability look like?

Then we talked about some internal stakeholders that you have there, too, but when you say job well done, this is what a successful use case is. What does that look like to you?

Mary Jane Melendez: I would say it's different by stakeholder group. So first and foremost, I would say investors are incredibly important because they are the ones who are putting the pressure on disclosures. They want companies to act. I think that that group giving them a more human, personal, real, natural environment experience brings this work to life in a very, very different way. So I think the investors like, for me, success is the fact that we had eight investment firms fly in from New York and spend a day in Redwood Falls, Minnesota.

I mean it was fantastic. That's a lot to give up when you have those big jobs. You could tell there was a difference, appreciation, and understanding. I wish I could give every investor on the planet that experience of being on a regenerative farm because it really is totally eye-opening and mind-blowing.

I think just all of a sudden things click. It makes sense and you understand why this is such an important opportunity that we have in front of us. I would say that for employees, It's a little bit different. If we are retaining and attracting amazing talent who day after day I get new employees coming into my office telling me I came to General Mills because of Regenerative Agriculture Commitment or I came in because of the amount of food that this company has donated to Feeding America, and I've seen what it did for my community.

It matters. This work matters and employees expect companies to be doing good, but they want to work for companies where their values are aligned. I love the fact that this newer generation of employees who are coming in care so much about the planet. They're informed, they're educated on issues, and they seek out their own opportunities within their roles to help do better.

I have a lot of hope for the future when I see leaders like that, young leaders like that coming in and demonstrating what they can do and how they're thinking so differently

Keesa Schreane: Speaking of the future leaders, share your 2 to 5-year vision of where you would like to see your company specifically, but the industry more broadly, we know that there are some goals out there.

Do you have a clear vision about where you want to see things in terms of the sustainability landscape?

Mary Jane Melendez: Absolutely, in 2 to 5 years I hope, and I don't know how this will happen, but I hope the world figures out how to get out of Scope 3 gridlock. It is a very real challenge today. So at General Mills, we have made tremendous progress on our greenhouse gas emissions reductions in Scope 1 and Scope 2.

So things that are within our own control. We have reduced our Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions by 49 percent since 2020. I mean, huge, huge progress. Yet, our Scope 3 emissions are static. They're not moving yet. We're buying more ingredients. We're selling more products, and it's very challenging when you're talking about the emission that is coming at a farm level or emissions that are coming when a consumer is baking a cake at home.

We have to figure out how we influence areas that we do not have direct control over. How do we help to influence policy? We've got a great partnership with our government affairs team here at General Mills which is constantly advocating and working on our behalf to help advance climate-friendly, climate-smart policies and, and helping to elevate things that may not be working today and might be barriers for farmers to move to regenerative agriculture.

Many things that we need to influence over the next several years in order to see success. I hope, and I actually believe within the next five years, we will achieve our regenerative agriculture goal. I hope all of our peers do the same. I hope we knock those numbers out of the park before 2030. Again, I think Mother Nature needs us to do that, to help reverse some of the things that we're starting to see when it comes to either warming temperatures, more extreme weather events, or degrading ecosystems.

I hope in three to five years that we don't have stats like the fact that more than 800 million people are hungry. I hope we figure out how to improve the food system. I hope we reverse some of the trends we're seeing with pollinator decline and that with some of these changes, we actually see this resurgence as Mother Nature regenerates.

It's incredibly powerful how she can heal herself when given the opportunity to do so, and I hope that we have made some meaningful changes in that space so that our children and our grandchildren and the next generation of leaders who are sitting in this seat when I'm not here are not dealing with the same set of issues, but rather are working on things that are a little bit more promising and a little more hopeful when it comes to ecosystem health.

Keesa Schreane: Finally, you named three priority areas that you have right now. First of all, bringing GHG emissions down 30 percent. The next one, the regenerative agriculture, which is a theme throughout and also packaging. I want you to tell us something that we didn't know about the future of the industry. It could be in those three primary areas.

I know you're researching that right now, but tell us something that we did not know that you'd be privy to based on the research what you're finding, and what is standing out for you.

Mary Jane Melendez: I would say what I did not know was how farmers resonate so much with other farmers bringing these practices to life and the challenges that they are facing within their own communities because they are doing something that is so different than the way maybe their parents or their grandparents had managed the farm and some of the societal or social pressure or even, you know, being ostracized in their community. We had this farmer on Monday talk about the changes that he was making to his landscape meant that he didn't have straight rows of corn and soybeans, that his farm was messy because he had many, many things growing, you know, oats and all kinds of other things growing on his farm.

When he would go into the coffee shop on Saturday morning, his neighbors would not speak to him because they thought he had kind of lost it and didn't know why he wasn't keeping his farm clean and why he had all these other things growing there. He said socially it was very hard. He felt very isolated.

So this farmer connectivity and the farmer social support that our research and development team, in fact, it was our soil scientist who created this private Face group page or group for the farmers who are in our pilots. The support that they're providing for one another, the council, the safe space to have a conversation about how do you handle this when your neighbors aren't talking to you or people think that, you know, you're not farming in the way that you should be and something's not right.

That support has meant more for those farmers and I appreciated it when I first started hearing the feedback in 2020 about what the farmers were experiencing. So I think a very holistic support approach for farmers is needed as they make these pretty significant changes to their farms.

Keesa Schreane: We talk a lot about worker engagement, showing your workers, your employees, that you value them, that you respect them, that you're committed to them, and this is a clear example of the supply chain, your suppliers, your vendors, those who, who is in your supply chain and really showing them how much you want to see them succeed and advocate for them, and thus, a good example of that.

So, so much here from talking about your innovation with regenerative agriculture, talking about your engagement with stakeholders, whether that's the shareholders that you engage in some non-traditional ways, which is great, as well as farmers and also your commitments and really how to drive those commitments from developing the governing body to understanding who really needs to do what work in the organization to moving forward and understanding how to progress and how to see things advance.

So much going on and I am looking forward to our next conversation. Wonderful. Mary Jane Melendez, CSO at General Mills. Thank you so much, Mary Jane.

Mary Jane Melendez: Thanks for having me. It was a pleasure.