Danielle Fugere, president and chief counsel with As You Sow. Courtesy photo.

By stepping up to lead efforts on sustainable agriculture, General Mills Inc. has dodged a proxy fight with shareholder activist group As You Sow over the use of pesticides in the company’s supply chain.

Minnesota-based General Mills recently released its Global Responsibility Report 2019 and published new information, which outlines specific strategies for reducing pesticide use.

“By this action, General Mills is stepping up as a leader among its peers,” said a statement from As You Sow.

In March As You Sow and shareholders had placed a resolution on the company’s agenda for the Sept. 24 annual meeting. The resolution specifically names the company’s popular Cheerios brand cereal as being implicated in lawsuits over pesticide residue.

A similar resolution last year won 31% support. They withdrew this year’s resolution Aug. 15 after the company made public the new information dealing with pesticides.

General Mills referred questions to the report and its other published statements. It said general counsel Richard Allendorf was not available for comment.

The company’s published information lists four key strategies to reduce pesticide use: a detailed commitment to regenerative agriculture, continued work on integrated pest management, expansion of organic acreage, and protection of pollinators. The strategies “directly reduce farmer reliance on pesticides and other agrochemicals,” the company statement said.

Christy Spees, As You Sow’s environmental health program manager, and president Danielle Fugere have been working with General Mills’ investor relations and in-house counsel on resolving the pesticide issue.

Fugere, an attorney, said in a statement that the food industry has been locked into a system of pesticide use that is inflexible and harmful, damaging the pollinators needed to sustain agriculture. “We are pleased to see General Mills stepping up as a leader in moving toward clean food innovation,” she added.

Spees told Corporate Counsel that the group’s work with General Mills began in 2017 when it seemed the company had no public policy on pesticide use. She called it a “reputational risk” as well as an environmental one.

“Not much progress was seen after last year’s resolution, so we filed another one for 2019,” Spees said. “That brought the company back into conversations” that led to its publishing new commitments.

She said General Mills is the first company in the food industry to commit to regenerative agriculture, “which we see as a really major improvement and hope other food manufacturers will follow. They are also the first to take this explicit stance on pesticides … that they want their producers to use fewer pesticides.”

In General Mills’ 2019 responsibility report, chairman and CEO Jeffrey Harmening states, “We face tremendous change in our industry, with unprecedented social and environmental challenges. Navigating this landscape requires transformation and innovation at every level. We continue taking bold actions to advance sustainability … [and] we embrace our responsibility to help achieve a stable climate, healthy watersheds, strong ecosystems and better lives for farmers.”

Here are some other highlights from the report:

• General Mills is now the second-largest U.S. organic food producer.
• 85% of 10 priority ingredients are sustainably sourced, and the company is working toward 100%.
• It has made a 13% decrease in greenhouse gas emissions across its chain since 2010, with goals of reaching 28% by 2025 and sustainable levels by 2050.
• It has planted 55,000 acres of pollinator habitat.