Criticisms of Cargill

Did You Know?

• Cargill is one of four trading giants known as the ABCD group—ADM, Bunge, Cargill, and Dreyfus—that controls over fifty percent of the processing capacity in soybeans in the Brazilian Cerrado.
• In 2021, JBS, National Beef, Cargill, and Tyson were sued by grocers and wholesalers, which accused the four companies of working together to drive up the price of beef.
• In 2024, McDonald's Corporation sued Cargill and three other companies, along with their subsidiaries, for alleged price fixing.

Overview

Cargill Inc. remains under the control of the Cargill family, now in its fifth generation. Since at least the early 2000s, the RSPO and other organizations have raised environmental concerns about Cargill’s operations across multiple industries and countries. The RSPO has noted that as the most influential palm oil producer and trader in the U.S., Cargill could set a major precedent for global agribusiness if it took bold steps to lessen the environmental harm from its palm oil activities. Additionally, a 2016 book, The Political Economy of Agricultural Booms: Managing Soybean Production in Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay, labeled Cargill a cartel.

Environmental damage

A number of environmental and human rights organizations, along with the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization and the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil, have raised concerns about Cargill’s palm oil operations in Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. Cargill has publicly committed to producing palm oil sustainably through its corporate social responsibility policies. However, an RSPO investigation in 2010 found a significant gap between Cargill’s stated commitments and its actual practices on the ground. That same year, Cargill was the largest U.S. importer of palm oil, sourcing from at least 26 producers and purchasing roughly 11 percent of Indonesia’s total palm oil output. Indonesia, which had the world’s highest deforestation rate—losing an average of 20 square miles of rainforest each day—was the epicenter of this expansion and produced more than 45 percent of the world’s palm oil. Palm oil is a widely traded commodity found in packaged foods, cosmetics, cleaning products, and biofuels. Grown on large-scale industrial monoculture plantations in tropical regions, oil palm has severe and widespread negative effects on both the environment and local communities.

Human rights abuses

The case was filed on behalf of six individuals who had been taken from Mali and forced into labor in Côte d'Ivoire as children. They worked twelve to fourteen hours daily without pay, received minimal food and rest, and were beaten regularly. The child plaintiffs, acting as class representatives, used the pseudonym John Doe out of concern for retaliation from the farm owners where they had been held. In 2014, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco refused to dismiss the case, ruling that the claims described overseas slave labor that the companies allegedly directed from their U.S. headquarters. Two years later, in January 2016, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to halt the lawsuit, allowing it to proceed. By January 2020, Cargill and Nestlé asked the Supreme Court to end the litigation, which had been moving through the federal courts for fifteen years. The Los Angeles Times reported that the companies were accused of supporting slave labor by providing financial aid to Ivory Coast farmers, with the expectation that cocoa prices would remain low. The lawsuit claimed the companies knew child slavery was occurring. The Supreme Court then requested guidance from the Trump administration, signaling an interest in expanding legal protections for corporations against lawsuits brought by victims of human rights abuses abroad.

Contamination

The company agreed to treat the grain with methylmercury, a substance banned in many Western nations. The shipment was dyed red to signal its toxicity and to show it was meant only for agricultural use, not for people or animals. After the grain arrived in Iraq in early October, the government distributed the surplus to the public. Many recipients ate it because the only warnings about the poison were printed in English and Spanish, intended for American dock workers. This mistake caused 93 deaths. Most were sold at Walmart and Sam's Club stores. In March 2009, Australia's Quarantine and Inspection Service temporarily suspended Cargill Australia's export license for meat to Japan and the United States after E. coli was found in containers from its Wagga Wagga plant. The suspension was lifted in late April 2009.