This briefing is a supplement to the Corporate Watch report 'Control freaks - the GMO exporters', which analyses the roles of Cargill, Archer Daniels Midland and their competitors in the supply chain for genetically-modified crops and food. This supplement gives general, background information on Cargill, its culture and activities, and on its UK presence.

Unlike the main report, this supplement does not attempt to present any new analysis. Rather it provides a set of resources for activists (especially, but not exclusively in Britain), and also brings together in summary some of the excellent critiques of Cargill - notably:

• Brewster Kneen, 'Invisible Giant - Cargill and its transnational strategies' (book) [1]
• Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology, 'Cargill - the giant among grain merchants' (booklet)[2]
• Brewster Kneen, 'Corporate food security' (research paper)[3]
• Agribusiness Examiner, weekly newsletter monitoring corporate agribusiness from a public interest prospective[4]
• The Ramshorn, monthly journal of food system analysis[5]

Portrait of Cargill

Trading style

Cargill's approach is totally geared around scale, and as a result, power. Economic power over its suppliers - the farmers and family businesses whom it dwarfs - allow it to force down its input costs. Economic power over its customers - the food processors and retailers - let it set the selling prices, and dictate the nature of the product (as in the GMO case, discussed in the 'Control Freaks' report. Political power, largely over the US government, sets up the trading rules which favour its interests so strongly, over its suppliers, customers and foreign competitors.

In most of its markets, Cargill controls a share of at least 25%, and is the largest or second largest player. Cargill is in economic terms what it wants to implement ecologically: a global monoculture.

Its operating style is neatly summed up in a company 'Future strategic profile' in 1979, which listed nine "strategic basic beliefs", including [6] :

• "It is important to have market dominance / leadership in the business.
• The world is our oyster.
• We will maintain a low public profile."

Cargill's unofficial biographer Brewster Kneen noted in his 1995 classic, 'Invisible Giant - Cargill and its transnational strategies',

"In the world of capitalist business, the use of power has one primary objective: the accumulation of capital, and with it, more power. Cargill Incorporated is a shining example of a corporation successfully using power to accumulate capital, all the while shaping the global future of agriculture and eating practices of people around the world" [7].

Food and hunger

Cargill aims to motivate its employees with the belief that the company's mission is to provide food to the world, and hence to tackle hunger. This vision it supports using two main arguments:

1) localised food production and distribution is vulnerable to instabilities in local conditions - from weather to pests to civil disorder. A globalised system has a range of sources of supply, so there is no crisis if one fails; meanwhile the market allocates these fairly and efficiently.

2) greater agricultural production, achieved through economies of scale arising from specialisation in particular crops, and through more efficient methods, will both increase farm incomes and reduce prices for consumers.

In the consequences were less serious, the simplistic contradictions and misconceptions (or rather, disingenuousness), contained within these arguments themselves, would be almost laughable.

Firstly, if the aim is really to avoid vulnerability to climatic and other conditions, the prescription for countries to specialise in just the crops in which they are said to have a 'comparative advantage', and to plant up huge monocultures, is utterly the wrong one. Traditionally, security of food supply through the risk of unfavourable conditions has been achieved by growing a diversity of crops. A single crop, and especially a small number of varieties of that crop, can all be lost due to disease or the wrong weather at the wrong time. At the very least, the farmers run the risk of loosing their livelihoods.

Secondly, the idea that farmers can increase their incomes through handling greater volumes, despite falling consumer prices, is not borne out by experience. As agriculture has intensified, incomes of all but the largest farmers and agribusinesses have fallen. And the greater the volumes produced, the more will fall the prices at which harvests can be sold. Meanwhile, the more modern agricultural methods require much higher input costs - in seed, pesticides, herbicides and machinery.

What's more, on top of declining incomes, farmers lose control over their production, and become dependent both on the suppliers of their inputs on the exporters of their harvests. Cargill is involved in both of these businesses, supplying fertilisers (and until recently, seeds), and distributing and processing produce.

Thirdly, the model does not even help the consumers of the food. While farm incomes have plummeted over recent years, the consumer price of foods has actually increased. Cargill's argument that food supply is more secure ignores how much the food costs. Cargill's arguments are really targeted at the middle classes in the rich north, where being able to afford food is a natural assumption. Thus the platitude that the theoretical availability of food may have increased is negated by the fact that people can't afford it.

This point is well made by the Indian NGO, the Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology, which notes that the shift of a nation's agriculture from food production to cash crop production runs alongside a shift in food sourcing from domestic production to imports. A nation's ability to import food depends on: i) its foreign exchange reserves and its ability to generate foreign exchange through exports; and ii) the international price of food. In other words, the availability of food moves from being dependent on factors within the country's border to being dependent on those without. And much of both the ability to export and the international price depend on political and economic decisions by the likes of Cargill.

The other element of disingenuousness in Cargill's description of agriculture is that it portrays itself as continuous with - or even part of - the farming community. It frequently claims to be speaking 'for farming', as a business involved in farming. Thus what is good for Cargill, it is assumed, must be good for the farmer. The benefits Cargill describes for the food and agricultural sector as a whole - in terms of the flexibility of having different sources of supply, the lowered commodity costs due to greater volumes, the economies if scale - are in fact, benefits for itself, but with sleight of hand we are encouraged to think the beneficiaries include farmers and consumers. Furthermore, the intensive system creates fertiliser markets for Cargill, export-led agriculture creates distribution markets, and regional specialisation in monocultural crops gives Cargill greater market power over its suppliers (who all have to compete for its custom).

As an example of who benefits from the globalised food market, in 1996, the US wheat crop was destroyed by drought and disease, while India produced a bumper crop. Cargill and Continental (which Cargill has since bought) bought wheat at $60 - 100 / tonne from India, and sold it at $230 - 240 / tonne on the international market. By trading with these multinationals, India lost $100m in export income. The export created shortages within India, and later in the year the 2 million tonnes that had been exported had to be re-imported at the market price (far higher than what India had been paid). The Research Foundation comments,

"Agricultural growth did take place, but not in terms of food and not for India. The quantity of wheat in the world and in India remained the same, and India's foreign exchange expenditure increased, leaving India financially poorer; only the Merchants of Grain benefited, and immensely at that [8].

Globalisation gives Cargill a further opportunity to extract wealth from the public, by tax avoidance. Cargill's commodity trading arm Tradax International is based in Panama, a tax haven, and much of the profit from Cargill's international trades are accounted on Tradax.

Aid for trade

The USA's Food for Peace aid programme, PL480, has been used strategically by Cargill, first to get paid to offload its surpluses (rather than allow them to force down the international commodity prices and eat into its profits), and second to undermine any competition, thus positioning Cargill to make commercial sales to the recipient country later. Senator Hubert Humphrey, who had close links with Cargill, commented, "If you are looking for a way to get people to lean on you and be dependent on you, in terms of their cooperation with you, it seems to me that food dependence would be terrific". According to the Research Foundation, seven of the ten countries receiving PL480 became seven of the ten best customers for US grain. By 1963, PL480 had generated nearly $2 bn in sales for Cargill and Continental Grain [9].

Cargill and ADM have also employed an aid-funded dumping strategy to get rid of GM crops they couldn't sell. In September 2000, the director of the Africa regional office of the international organisation for consumers wrote to the US president complaining about the dumping of unlabelled GM maize in Africa, concerned about the health and environmental impacts [10].
Burying US farming

It is not just in the South that Cargill has attacked farmers' livelihoods. Cargill played a significant role in pressurising the US government to move away from its farmer support programmes and eventually adopt the Federal Agricultural Improvement and Reform Act in 1996, otherwise known as Freedom to Farm (see below), or to its critics "Freedom to fail".

Since the Depression of the 1930s, the USA had in place price supports, whereby if the market price for a commodity fell below the farmer's cost in producing it, the government would cover the difference, and production controls, to keep volumes up and prices down. The result of removing the latter is that (parallel to the situation in the developing world) farmers are forced to maximise production in order to achieve reasonable earnings, but this in turn forces the prices down further.

Shortly after the law was passed, in December 1996, Cargill's Dan Pearson commented, "Freedom to Farm has really positioned the US very well to take advantage of the opportunities on the world market" [11]. Once again, this is conflating Cargill's interests with those of American agriculture. Not only is Cargill now able to buy crops more cheaply from farmers (thus expanding its own margins), farmers are forced into more intense competition with each other to sell their harvests - thus increasing Cargill's power over them. Meanwhile, farmers are (as they were in the 1930s and earlier) exposed to the wild fluctuations in market conditions. This volatility actually suits Cargill well, as it can profit from speculation - for example by storing crops if it thinks the price will improve later.

The food supply chain is undergoing major consolidation at the moment, as particularly evidenced in Cargill's takeover in 1998/99 of the grain handling businesses of Continental Grain, its second largest rival after ADM. The result is that farmers have less choice of who to sell to, as often there are only two companies owning local elevators; this means in turn, less choice of which crops and varieties to grow, and less bargaining power on price.

Free trade agreements

Cargill has strong policymaking power and is a major player in the GATT/WTO process that drives international trade liberalisation. Such liberalisation has enhanced its structural dominance of markets. Cargill plays an important role in US government advisory boards and seeks to further its goals in the arena of domestic US politics.

Cargill seeks to use international free trade agreements to reverse government programmes and policies around the world, which don't suit its interests. The company commented during the Ministerial meeting of the World Trade Organisation in Seattle in November 1999,

"Opening the food system to freer trade will give farmers' opportunities to grow and prosper, satisfy consumers' desires for greater choice and security, and promote peaceful prosperity across the globe. The ministers gathered in Seattle can serve no nobler cause" [12].

Cargill is keen to maintain and enhance its dominance of the market so as to reduce farm incomes and consumer choice (see above), and the terms of the WTO provide a perfect mechanism to do this.

Cargill was heavily involved in the development of the African Growth and Opportunity Act, also known as "NAFTA for Africa", or in African press reports as the "African Recolonisation Act". According to the Act, African countries must impose harsh IMF-style domestic social and economic policy changes, in return for enhanced trade relations with the U.S. The conditions include budget cuts in health and education, privatization of public assets, and cuts in corporate taxes. The AGOA neo-liberal programme is opposed by a wide variety of groups including African churches, plus development, justice, and labour organisations [13]. Cargill has offices and facilities in eight sub-Saharan African countries, involved in processing and trading of cotton, cocoa, oilseeds and rice; development and marketing of hybrid maize, sunflower, sorghum and soyabeans; trading of sugar and grain; and consultancy through Cargill Technical Services. It has annual sales in Africa of $200m [14] .

Political power

Cargill is involved in the government of the USA both as lobbyist or think-tank, and as advisor or participant, often on the same issues. Cargill's biggest political issue is free trade, and trade and investment deregulation.

Revolving doors - in both directions

William Pearce, a former Cargill vice president for public affairs joined the Nixon administration. He became deputy special representative for trade negotiations, an appointment that gave him the rank of ambassador. In 1972 Pearce was one of the main drafters of the report of the Presidential Commission on International Trade (the Williams Commission), one of whose recommendations was that other countries should remove their agricultural trade barriers and other policies which supported "inefficient" farmers. This was incorporated in Nixon's New Economic Policy. In 1974 he was on the Committee for Economic Development, which aimed to develop US domestic agricultural policies designed to remove US agriculture's "excess human resources" - ie farmers [15]. After that he re-joined Cargill [16].

Daniel Amstutz - who was Cargill's assistant vice president for feed grains from 1967 to 1972, and president of Cargill Investor Services from 1972 to 1978 - became Undersecretary of Agriculture for international affairs and commodity programs, and president of the Commodity Credit Corporation in 1983. All of this made him chief policy officer for US farm programs. He was heavily involved in the 'Food security of 1985' policy discussions which suggested removing all government support for farmers - he drafted a proposal to phase out government support over a five to ten year period, while farmers "adjusted" either to a free market or to a "transition" out of agriculture. While this proposal failed, it re-emerged ten years later and was enacted as the devastating Freedom to Farm Act [17] (see above). From 1987-1989 he held the rank of Ambassador as chief negotiator for Agriculture in the GATT negotiation. Since 1989 he has worked as a consultant for Cargill again [18].

Michael Armacost, a Cargill non-executive director and president of the Brookings Institute think-tank, has been US ambassador to Japan and the Philippines, and Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs. He has also held senior positions in the National Security Council and the Department of Defense. He is a former Distinguished Senior Fellow and Visiting Professor at the Asia / Pacific Research Center in Stanford University [19].

The former Democrat US Vice-president Walter Mondale was elevated to Cargill's board of directors on the eve of Bill Clinton's inauguration in 1993 [19a]. Mondale was later appointed as US ambassador to Japan and stepped down from the board.

Government advisors

Former Cargill chairman and CEO Ernest Micek was one of Bill Clinton's 38 members of the President's Export Council, which advises the US President of government policies and programs that affect U.S. trade performance [20]. The 28 private-sector members of the Council are appointed by the President, and serve "at the pleasure of the President," with no set term of office [21]. Micek was also appointed by Clinton to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Business Advisory Council, whose role is to advise APEC governments [22].

Ernest Micek was one of the three CEOs who accompanied Clinton on a visit to Africa in March 1998, during discussions on the African Growth and Opportunity Act [23].

Micek's predecessor Whitney MacMillan was appointed in 1993 (while still Cargill chairman) to a panel shaping the final negotiations on GATT, by Senator Bob Dole and Representative Richard Gephart [24].

Frank Sims, President of Cargill Ag Producer Services, has been appointed a member of the US Department of Agriculture's newly formed advisory committee on Agricultural Biotechnology, which "will advise the secretary on policy related to the creation, application, marketability, trade and use of agricultural biotechnology [25]."

Lobbying

Cargill is a member of the Corporate Council on Africa [26] and of the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act Coalition, two of the main organisations lobbying for the African Growth and Opportunity Act.

Ernest Micek is chairman of the Emergency Committee for American Trade (ECAT), a coalition of US multinationals which lobbies for trade liberalisation, largely through the World Trade Organisation [27]. ECAT also lobbied hard (and successfully) for China's entry into the World Trade Organisation, and for Permanent Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) between China and the USA. Micek even boasted to the government's Ways and Means Committee about the extent of the lobbying activity [28]:

"We are working flat out, both here in Washington and in congressional districts across the country, to make the case for PNTR. ECAT member companies are out in full force contacting members here in Washington and in their local districts. We are also supporting grass roots efforts on China PNTR through ECAT's 'Trade: Discover the Opportunity' employee trade education program".

And the reason? Micek admits [29] ,

"In Cargill's case, the removal of tariff and non-tariff barriers on grain, proteins, and other agricultural commodities and the elimination of restrictions on distribution and trading rights under the US-China bilateral WTO agreement will open vast new market opportunities. These changes will mean increased exports and sales for our animal feed and soybean crushing facilities in China, and will open new investment opportunities in Chinese agriculture".

 Whitney MacMillan, has been an active member of the Business Round Table, and influential lobby group made up of America's leading CEOs. He also sits on the board of the Hubert Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs [30].

'Grassroots' campaigns

The Cargill Community Network is used by the corporation to generate support for its policy objectives by mimicking the approach of grassroots NGOs. For example, in 1992 the CCN put together 'Ohioans for Responsible Health Information' to campaign against a right to know proposal. The proposal was framed as damaging to small businesses and the local economy and was heavily defeated. Given that opinion polls has previously suggested strong support for the proposal Cargill's intervention was almost certainly decisive [30a].

In 1991 the company used videos, radio commentaries and newspaper columns to defeat a campaign to resist the construction of a nitrogen fertilizer plant in Saskatchewan in Canada. Cargill also provided employees at 600 hundred locations in the USA with cards to post to congressman to lobby for NAFTA. Employees were told, 'NAFTA is important to Cargill because it clears the way for what we do' [30b].
A run-down of corporate crimes

USA - undermining unions: According to Brewster Kneen, when Cargill bought the Seminole fertilizer plant at Ford Meade in 1993, the company made all employees sign resignation slips, then hired back those they wanted at lower wages and with only two weeks vacation [31]. It has a reputation for pursuing a highly aggressive management style both in the US and globally. Again, when the company bought four flour mills from Grand Metropolitan, it fired 51% of the staff, abolished the union and then rehired approximately 30% of the former employees [32].

USA - pollution: In 1993 Cargill was placed on Mother Jones magazine's Toxic Ten list. The magazine noted it "has been cited for 2000 OSHA violations since 1987, spilled 40 000 gallons of toxic phosphoric solution into the Alafia River in Florida in 1988, causing a massive fish kill; since 1991 had the worst air compliance record of any company in its industry; and scored second-lowest among its competitors on CEP's [Council on Economic Priorities'] Greendex, which measures the environmental soundness of PAC contributions." It is also one of the top two producers of toxics in its industry according to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). In 1991, then Governor Bill Clinton criticised the company for releasing animal waste, equal to the excrement produced by ten times the state's human population into Arkansas rivers [33].

Florida, USA - exploiting suppliers: In 1989 Cargill was ordered to pay about $2.6 million in a class-action settlement to poultry producers who served a processing plant in Florida. The lawsuit alleged that Cargill had intentionally underweighed the poultry. In December 1989 the U.S. Department of Agriculture filed a separate lawsuit alleging that Cargill had illegally terminated Arthur Gaskins, president of the Northeast Florida Broiler Growers Association, for organizing the lawsuit against Cargill. In 1990, the court ordered Gaskins reinstated. In 1992, the court certified the lawsuit as a class action involving 143 growers and Cargill recently settled the case, admitting no liability [34].

USA - price-fixing: In 1937, Cargill was suspended from the Chicago Board of Trade for cornering the maize market. Similar charges were made in 1963 in relation to wheat, and in 1973 to soyabeans. In 1976, a Senate Subcommittee accused Cargill and five other grain traders of supplying false market data in order to influence market prices; and in 1984 Brazil accused them of doing this with soyabeans. In 1984, Cargill announced that it would buy 1 million bushels of Argentinian wheat in order to force down the US wheat price, while strengthening US anti-farmer policies through the power shift [35].

Bolivia - environmental destruction: According to the journal Agbiz Tiller, in 1997 the Bolivian government carried out massive dredging at the port in Puerto Aguirre, during in 1997, on behalf of Cargill, which has a controlling interest in the grain terminal. The purpose was to open the Tamengo Channel - which connects with the Paraguay River, eventually leading into the Atlantic - to convoys of barges carrying soya beans and meal. The project went against the recommendations of environmental impact studies funded by the Inter-American

Development Bank and the United Nations Development Programme. Independent studies indicated that even small changes in the level of the Paraguay River, part of South America's second most important system, might cause irreversible damage to the Pantanal, the world's largest remaining wetlands ecosystem. The company has a long history of seeking to open up new watercourses and expand ports so as to reduce transport costs. Such projects are largely funded by national governments, benefit corporations and have worrying ecological implications. With the expansion of soya monoculture in the Santa Cruz province, the dredging at Puerto Aguirre will allow the company to export more easily to European markets. For more than three years, the project was challenged by a coalition of environmental, human rights and social justice groups, and indigenous peoples called Rios Vivos. In 1997 the city of Puerto Suarez staged a general strike in protest [36].

Venezuela - environmental destruction: According to Brewster Kneen, the company is currently planning a threefold expansion of its salt production in the Los Olivitos wetland in Venezuela, threatening the mangrove swamps and the fishery in the local lagoon ecosystem. The wetlands are nationally and internationally recognized as valuable; with 33 000 hectares of mangrove swamps, littoral lagoon (estuary), salt marshes, sandy beaches and dunes lying within the Maracaibo estuary. Much of the Olivitos estuary has already been declared a wildlife refuge and fishing reserve under Venezuelan law. Cargill built a 17km dyke with disastrous consequences. Fishermen's catches fell by half, while severe flooding and mudslides took place. The company now wants to discharge the highly-alkaline toxic "bittern" (by-product of salt-production) directly into Lake Maracaibo. Local people physically obstructed construction of the bittern pipeline. During the confrontation it was discovered that the size of the pipe exceeded the permitted diameter and capacity allowed by the environmental authorities. It became obvious that corrupt Ministry of Environment officials had authorized the work illegitimately. The Environmental Ministry canceled the permit, promising the villagers a public hearing, yet Cargill obtained a fresh pipeline permit with no public hearing. 1000 villagers protested and began to burn the pipeline, reducing almost half a kilometer to puddles of molten PVC. Cargill has now been taken to court and having made a number of legal errors it is possible the villagers will win [37].

India - seed control: Cargill Seeds India, a company joint venture, has been targeted by a mass movement of farmers who fear that seed patents will rob them of their freedom to use indigenous varieties of crops. In 1992 five hundred farmers belonging to Karnataka Rajya Ryyota Sangha (KRRS) stormed their offices and burnt all the seed samples and papers they could find. In 1993 the KRRS demolished a Cargill seed-processing factory north of Bangalore, using poles and their bare hands. Kneen commentated, 'The leaders of the KRRS took me to villages and towns to talk to farmers and seed dealers and everywhere the story was the same: the hybrid sunflower seed that Cargill had sold for commercial production in the last two years produced only a fraction of the advertised yield, no matter how strictly the suggestions for growing were followed, and no matter how costly the fertilizers and chemicals' [38].

India - attempted environmental damage: Cargill Southeast Asia obtained approval from the government foreign investment transportation board to set up a 100 per cent export-oriented unit to produce one million tonnes of high-quality sun-dried or solar industrial salt a year. "The silting could cause major technical and ecological problems" commented the Financial Times and the local Kandla Port Trust, which manages the area refused to give Cargill permission for the project. If Cargill were given the land to produce salt, its earnings could have been in the hundreds of thousands of rupees but the public cost of removing silt from the harbour would have been in the millions. Cargill's proposal would have stopped about one-third of the tidal flow, causing siltation and affecting shipping. The proposal would have also damaged local mangroves, creating an ecological imbalance. Opponents also argued that Cargill's plans threatened the livelihoods of 25 000 people involved in salt production in the region and that many others in the port area would lose their livelihoods because of the project Central government tried to overrule the KPT's objections but a successful campaign of local resistance forced Cargill's withdrawal [39].
Company profile:

SIZE
Cargill is the 16th largest company in the USA [40], and the largest privately-owned (i.e. not listed on any stock exchange) company in the world [41]. Cargill is the 3rd largest food and drink company in the USA, the 3rd largest in Europe, the largest in Asia and the largest in South America [42]. It has facilities in 59 countries and operates in 130 others [43].

1999, fiscal year ended May [44]:
Sales US$ 50,000m
Income US$ 597m
Employees 84 000

As a private company, Cargill is not generally required to disclose any information. It is only in the last five years that it has even made this basic financial information available.

Cargill's headquarters is at:
15407 McGinty Road West, Wayzata, MN 55391, USA
Tel +1 612 742 7575

It has more than 1,000 sites in 59 countries, and some form of operations in 130 others [45].

ACTIVITIES

Cargill is involved in a diverse range of businesses, mainly agricultural. We have given a run-down (in appendix 3 of the 'Control Freaks' report) of its interests relevant to the GM crops soya, maize and cotton (including meat production). Other areas include [46]:

• agricultural commodity trading and processing, including other grains (e.g. wheat, rice, sorghum), other oilseeds (e.g. sunflower seed, flaxseed, palm, copra, peanuts), sugar, cocoa, apples, malts, oranges (processed into juice)
• food processing (it has a few food brands in the USA, including Honeysuckle White and Riverside (poultry), Sunny Fresh (eggs) and Gerkens (cocoa) );
• feed and fertilizer production (including phosphate mining), and agricultural merchanting;
• financial trading, futures brokering - although now it only gets involved in financial services to support its own operations;
• transportation services (mainly shipping and stevedoring);
• salt;
• trading of rubber (although it plans to sell this business) and petroleum;
• steelmaking and steel products.

Cargill Technical Services provides consultancy, management and technical assistance services in all aspects of agricultural and agribusiness development, natural resource management and rural development. Work includes, amongst other things [47]:

• advising and assisting USAID on agriculture and food production systems on agriculture and food production systems - US AID is the US government's development agency, which through its food aid programme provides a useful outlet for Cargill's surplus grain (see above);

• providing technical assistance in developing countries for private sector policy and regulatory reform and for developing programs and projects that support the emergence and growth of the private sector - in other words exerting its influence and power yet further over producing countries.

DIRECTION OF TRAVEL

(For more on this, see Brewster Kneen's reveiws of developments)[48]

Recent investments include:

Cargill Dow Polymers, a 50:50 joint venture with Dow Chemical, is developing plastics from maize and wheat. In 2000, the factory in Blair, Nebraska, began commercial production.

In 1997, Cargill moved into production of the animal feed additive lysine, putting it into competition with ADM. It formed Midwest Lysine, a joint venture with the German chemicals company Degussa-Huls.

Also in 1997, Cargill bought Akzo Nobel's American salt businesses, making Cargill the second largest US salt company.

In 1999, Cargill bought the grain distribution division of Continental Grain. While such consolidation makes sense as an answer to supply chain over-capacity, the extra facilities will give Cargill greater flexibility to supply identity speciality grains to specialist markets. Along with the moves into bio-plastics and lysine, it suggests it is to some degree following ADM's strategy of adding value, which most analysts believe is an unavoidable trend in the food industry as a whole. Cargill now describes itself as providing "distinctive customer solutions in supply chain management, food aplications and health and nutrition".

In 2000, Cargill has got very involved in online trading, including www.rooster.com (a joint venture with DuPont and Cenex Harvest States, selling to farmers), www.novopoint.com (selling to the food and beverage industry) and www.pradium.com (a joint venture with ADM, Louis Dreyfus, DuPont and Cenex Harvest States, for commodity trading in soyabeans, maize and their by-products).

In July 2000, Cargill bought Fontina Foods, an American herb, spice and condiment company.

In December 2000, Cargill agreed a takeover of Agribrands International, a Canadian animal feeds company, with 70 manufacturing plants in 17 countries [49].

There are also divestments:

Cargill has sold its seed interests, outside North America in 1998 to Monsanto, and the North American business in September 2000 to Dow subsidiary Mycogen (although Cargill has kept InterMountain Canola, which has been developing GM varieties, Goertzen Seed Research and its West Canada seed distribution business). Cargill felt it did not have sufficient biotechnology expertise to compete in the seed market. In both deals, it lost money due to legal liabilities arising from misappropriated seed technology.

In June 2000, Cargill announced the sale of all of its coffee business to Ecom Agroindustrial Corp of Switzerland. It alsoplans to sell its rubber businesses. Both of these offer little opportunity either for vertical integration or for profit mark-up.

 In recent years Cargill has pulled back from financial speculation, having lost a lot of money in the Asian crisis.
Top dogs and fat cats - Who runs Cargill?

[Here are listed just the most important positions in the company, plus senior management relating to GMOs - there are other vice presidents and presidents] [50]

Board of directors [51]

MANAGEMENT DIRECTORS (these are the people who really run the company) [52]:
Board Chairman + CEO: Warren Staley (age 58)
President + Chief Operating Officer: Greg Page (age 48)
Vice Chairman + Chief Financial Officer: Robert Lumpkins
Vice Chairman: Guillaume Bastiaens
Vice Chairman: David Raisbeck

Warren Staley is only Cargill's seventh chairman since it was founded by William Cargill in 1865, and only the third not to be a member of either the Cargill or MacMillan families. He took over from Ernest Micek (also a non-family member) as CEO in 1999, and chairman in 2000 [53].

COMMON SHAREHOLDER DIRECTORS:

Cargill has two types of non-executive director: shareholders (about 85% of Cargill is owned by 80 members of the Cargill and MacMillan families)[54] and independents (representatives of other companies, hired for their management experience, knowldege or contacts, as in other companies).

The common shareholder directors are:

William MacMillan, Marianne Cargill Liebmann, Duncan MacMillan (brother of Whitney MacMillan, who was chairman from 1976 - 1995), Lucy Stitzer, David MacMillan, Austen Cargill (also Vice President - Research & Development).

INDEPENDENT DIRECTORS [55]:

Michael Armacost (the Brookings Institution - for his political connections and knowledge of Asia (see below) ), Arthur Collins (Medtronic Inc - for his biotechnology knowledge), Livio DeSimone (3M), Curtis Johnson (SC Johnson Commercial Markets Inc), Richard Kovacevich (Wells Fargo & Co - for his financial knowledge), Michael Wright (SUPERVALU Inc).

Corporate officers [56]

The most senior non-board-member managers are:
Executive Vice President + President of Agriculture Biosciences Group: Frederic ("Fritz") Corrigan
Executive Vice Presidents: David Larson, Hubertus Spierings
Senior Vice President + Director of Public Affairs: Robbin Johnson
Senior Vice President: David Rogers
Corporate Vice President + Chief Technology Officer: Ronald Christenson
Corporate Vice President, Public Affairs: Bonnie Raquet
Corporate Vice Presidents: William Buckner, John Geisler (Dry Milling Division President), James Haymaker, John March, Michael Urbanic, James Moe (General Counsel + Secretary), Steven Euller (Deputy General Counsel), Galen Johnson (Controller), Frank Sims (Transportation), Nancy Siska (Human Resources), Lloyd Taylor (Information Technology), William Veazey (Treasurer)

And the others dealing with GMOs include:
Renessen (Cargill-Monsanto) Joint Venture Co-CEO: Norman Hay
Animal Nutrition Division President, Richard Frasch
Biosciences Division: Robert Parmelee

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