Politics of Poverty

Taking the carbon out of Frosted Flakes

August 13, 2014 Posted by Irit Tamir

Kellogg will require suppliers to measure and publicly disclose agricultural emissions.

Fifth-generation Missouri farmer Richard Oswald’s petition on change.org garnered over 115,000 signatories in just two and a half months. Why was his call to Kellogg and General Mills to reduce emissions in their agricultural supply chains so successful?

The Richard Oswald farm in Langdon, Missouri before and during the 2011 flood. Photo: Courtesy of Richard Oswald

Perhaps it was because Oswald himself has seen first-hand how climate has impacted his family farm and home state of Missouri when record floods hit in 2011. The floods washed out any potential harvest of corn, a crop he grows that is sold in the commercial market to companies like Kellogg and General Mills.

The signatories to Oswald’s petition made up the more than 230,000 “Behind the Brands” supporters that have called on both Kellogg and General Mills to do more to stave off climate change, so that farmers around the world can continue to feed their families and rely on their farming livelihoods.

Just a couple of weeks ago, General Mills made sweeping commitments to reducing emissions in its supply chains that went beyond what any food and beverage company has done prior.

Now Kellogg is upping the ante with a new commitment on climate change announced today.

Like General Mills, Kellogg will join the advocacy coalition, Business for Innovative Climate and Energy Policy (BICEP), a group of businesses committed to working with policy makers to pass meaningful energy and climate legislation and sign on to its Climate Declaration. And like General Mills, Kellogg will set a total supply chain emissions reduction target in 2015, which includes upstream agricultural emissions and is consistent with science-based methodology and long-term goals to keep global temperature change below 2°C.

But Kellogg has gone even further. By incorporating their climate and deforestation policies into their supplier code of conduct and expectations, they will require suppliers to measure and publicly disclose their emissions reduction targets. This is significant because at the end of the day, companies will only be able to reduce emissions in their supply chains with engagement and innovation from their suppliers. While General Mills took a huge step forward in their recent commitment, the company did not send as strong of a signal to its suppliers. Kellogg has committed to holding its suppliers accountable when it comes to establishing and implementing their emissions reduction targets.

Kudos to Kellogg for setting its own race to the top among its suppliers in driving innovation. This means we’ll get to enjoy our Frosted Flakes with less carbon.

Irit Tamir

Irit Tamir is the Director of Oxfam America's Private Sector Department. In her role, she is focused on working with companies to ensure that their business practices result in positive social and environmental impacts for vulnerable communities throughout the world. She leads a team of advisors that engage the private sector on tax, business and human rights, vaccine equity, legal advocacy, supply chain and labor relations, climate change and gender and racial equity. She oversees the private sector engagement from campaigns and advocacy to collaborations and programs focused on corporate behavior along with a work focused on investors and shareholder advocacy.

Prior to working at Oxfam, Ms. Tamir was the Director of Government Relations at the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Boston, where she successfully lobbied for an extensive federal and state legislative agenda. She co-led the effort to pass the Sudan Divestment Bill in Massachusetts, which required the state pension funds to divest from companies doing business with the Government of Sudan in an effort to halt its human rights violations in Darfur. Ms. Tamir is an attorney with a masters in international law and has taught Business and Human Rights as an adjunct at Boston College Law School. She sits on the Board of the Fair Labor Association and co-chaired the Working Group on Business and Human Rights for the New York City Bar Association. A devoted human rights activist, she has spoken publicly about inequality, human rights, climate resilience, and the food system. Ms. Tamir has had years of experience in government relations and is a former prosecutor who supervised civil rights prosecutions and hate crimes.

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