Food Companies Backslide on Promises to Reduce Pesticides
April 08, 2026 | Source: Civil Eats | by Lisa Held
In 2019, food giant General Mills debuted a three-point strategy to reduce synthetic pesticide use within its supply chains. The plan was to implement regenerative agriculture practices on 1 million acres of farmland by 2030, increase the use of integrated pest management (IPM) on farms, and expand organic acreage.
More than six years later, the webpage that outlined that plan redirects visitors to a page on regenerative agriculture, where the word “pesticide” does not appear.
“They are no longer aligning their regenerative agriculture program with pesticide reduction at all, which is obviously concerning, because what the soil science points to is that regenerative without significant pesticide reduction is not regenerating soil health,” said Cailin Dendas, the senior coordinator of As You Sow’s Environmental Health Program.