General Mills, Inc.

General Mills, Inc. is a U.S.-based packaged food company headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Its brands include Cheerios, Pillsbury, Betty Crocker, Nature Valley, Blue Buffalo, and Häagen-Dazs. Since most of its water use comes from crops, livestock, packaging, and manufacturing sanitation, water stewardship matters throughout its operations and supply chain.

General Mills's best practice in terms of water includes the emphasis on the company's priority watersheds. The company recycles and reuses water as much as possible, given that only 2% of the company's water use is directly controlled by manufacturing facilities, while 84% is used in agricultural production and 14% is consumed in packaging.

General Mills uses such tools as WRI Aqueduct, WWF Water Risk Filter, WWF Biodiversity Risk Filter, and nutrient data to assess the risk in priority watersheds. In 2025, the company identified 15 priority watersheds, including California's Central Valley, Mississippi-Missouri, Great Lakes, Rio Grande-Bravo, Ganges-Bramaputra, Scheldt, China Coast, Ebro, La Plata, and others. Notably, 80% of the company's manufacturing facilities are located in three of these watersheds, which highlights their significance in General Mills's sustainability strategy.

One of the major examples of the company's water-related activities is represented by its work in the State of California. General Mills uses the state's almonds in its products, which means that the company relies on the agricultural production in the area. Given the water scarcity issues in the region, General Mills has implemented various water conservation initiatives, including funding of the UC Davis research on water use in almond farming, participation in the Regenerative Agriculture and Water Working Group, and investment in the Flood-MAR project, farmer coaching programs, and partnerships with American Farmland Trust, Sustainable Conservation, and Point Blue Conservation.

At the same time, General Mills also tracks the impact of its water stewardship efforts. In particular, the company's Albuquerque facility utilizes the water from the Rio Grande, meaning that any issues in the nearby areas may impact the operations of the facility. To address this, General Mills actively collaborates with The Nature Conservancy's Rio Grande Water Fund, which saw the stewardship of 7,007 acres of forest in the basin in 2024, with the focus on reducing the risk of wildfires and improving water quality. Besides, General Mills participated in similar initiatives in Arkansas, where the company uses rice in its Blue Buffalo products. In collaboration with The Nature Conservancy, General Mills has initiated the installation of timers that reduced the water consumption of farms by 20%, resulting in the conservation of 5.4 billion gallons of water.

Similarly, General Mills's operations in Ghana and Côte d'Ivoire have a significant impact on the water consumption of these countries. The company initiated a CARE partnership that educated 2,026 people in terms of water hygiene and improved the water access of two communities, including the digging of a new borehole in the Pourra region of Côte d'Ivoire.