Pesticides in the Pantry: Transparency & risk in food supply chains
Over one billion pounds of conventional pesticides¹ are used in the United States each year.² In the most recent year of data, Americans spent $9 billion on pesticides for use in agriculture.³ The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s biomonitoring has found pesticide residues in the bodies of 90% of Americans studied.⁴
Farming has not always required the intensive use of chemicals that constrains our farmers today. Humans have been growing food for over 10,000 years; it is only over the past 60 years that we have become dependent on a complicated and costly system of pesticide use. Following World War II, industrialization of agriculture and the introduction of pesticides (derived from chemicals invented as weapons), contributed to major growth in productivity and farm efficiency. But this shortcut has come with tremendous consequences. Science is now beginning to catch up with the myriad ways in which pesticides are harming humans, animals, and the environment. As new information exposes these growing risks, companies that rely on conventional agricultural supply chains are increasingly tied to these risks.
Pesticides in the Pantry: Transparency & Risk in Food Supply Chains is a report designed to examine the growing risks posed by the use of synthetic pesticides in agricultural supply chains to food manufacturers, and to provide benchmarks for improved management and transparency. Consumers, regulators, courts, and the media are paying increased attention to the human health and environmental harms caused by the intensive use of pesticides in agriculture. As a result, investors are calling on major food companies to reduce supply chain use of these chemicals to mitigate risk.
Pesticides in the Pantry scores 14 major U.S. food manufacturers on 30 performance indicators designed to measure how effectively companies are managing risk and advancing the interests of their stakeholders. Effective corporate management includes disclosure of robust strategies for the reduction of toxic pesticides and meaningful metrics for tracking performance and progress. The report also identifies alternative solutions to support supply chain producers in transitioning away from chemical-dependent farming systems.
RESULTS: In this inaugural year of benchmarking and reporting, companies’ average scores were relatively low, with two top scoring companies leading by significant margins. The total possible score for any company was 30. Scores ranged from 18 to 0, and companies averaged a score of 6.1. The top scoring companies – and the only two to score above 10 – were General Mills (18) and PepsiCo (14); the laggards were Post and B&G Foods (0 each) followed by Kraft Heinz, Conagra, and J.M. Smucker (2 each).
While the majority of the companies have some form of sustainable sourcing program in place for their supply chains, most lack clear criteria and almost none include pesticide use as an indicator within those programs. The majority of companies scored for the report do not currently provide goals, strategies, or targets for the reduction of pesticide use; however, some companies have noteworthy practices, which the report outlines. Almost half of companies have some type of Integrated Pest Management (IPM) program, but only one IPM program explicitly aims to reduce synthetic pesticides. The majority of companies belong to an industry sustainability collaborative, and most have a sustainable sourcing program in place for one or more specific (often specialty) crops, which provides interesting insight into the potential for this sector to engage in effective sustainable sourcing initiatives.
“Pesticides” includes all chemical products engineered to destroy any kind of agricultural pest (i.e. insecticides, herbicides, rodenticides, fungicides) and excludes natural or biological agents.
Donald Atwood and Claire Paisley-Jones, “Pesticides Industry Sales and Usage: 2008-2012 Market Estimates,” Biological and Economic Analysis Division, Office of Pesticide Programs, Office of Chemical Safety & Pollution Prevention, EPA, 2017, https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2017-01/documents/pesticides-industry-sales-usage-2016_0.pdf.
Ibid.
“Fourth National Report on Human Exposure to Environmental Chemicals,” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, DHHS, 2009,