Dairy

We carry out risk assessments of the dairy farmers involved in our supply chain against our Responsible Sourcing Standard (pdf, 2.4Mb), focusing on animal welfare, labor practices and environmental impact. Our farmers are assessed by independent auditors such as SGS. Since 2013, we have carried out almost 1349 farm assessments in 30 countries, identifying opportunities for improvement. We are also increasingly investing in projects that support sustainable dairy practices.

Digital technologies have the capacity to transform the dairy industry. We have digitized the traceability of our milk, from farm to factory, using a new tool called Global Milk Solution. It includes payroll, GPS tracking and route optimization to ensure transparency and transport efficiency. We are currently piloting more features for the tool, including calculating GHG emissions per farm or liter of milk to track progress and ensure continuous improvement.

Ensuring a fair, safe and healthy working environment for farm workers is a priority for Nestlé. For several years, Nestlé has collaborated with partners and stakeholders throughout our dairy supply chain to enhance farm workforce development in US dairy operations. The National Milk Producers Federation has also developed an on-farm evaluation tool to support farmers in understanding human resources and safety management best practices. The tool aids implementation of these best practices and tracks improvements over time. It provides a foundation for dairy farms to improve outcomes of health and safety, employee culture and turnover.

In 2020, Nestlé launched multiple projects to engage dairy workers, managers and owners in collaboratively enhancing the farm working culture. The projects focused on building trust and improving job satisfaction, worker safety and productivity. This is another example of how Nestlé is investing in our supply chain to advance industry-wide workforce development and reinforce safe, productive workplaces for employees.

Our pledge to reach net zero emissions by 2050 will push us to seek new innovations to offset and inset our emissions. One way we can achieve this is through implementing solutions with our dairy suppliers.

In 2019, we launched a pilot project in Switzerland and Pakistan aiming to tackle GHG emissions. In 2020, we developed GHG reduction roadmaps for most of our fresh milk sourcing markets to reduce emissions by 20% by 2025 and 50% by 2030. Additionally, several pilot farms and projects were initiated, in collaboration with academia and agricultural research centers, to support our emission reduction goals.

In South Africa, we launched the first ever net zero dairy farm – Skimmelkrans. Part of a three-year project, Skimmelkrans is a pasture-based dairy farm with 200 hectares under irrigation and 200 hectares of dryland pasture. A baseline carbon footprint was calculated for the farm, after which a team of specialists, academics and project leaders developed a roadmap for improvement. It is organized under two pillars:

• Physical interventions to reduce GHG emissions, including establishing a solar plant and manure screening plant, incorporating feed additives to address cattle enteric fermentation and transitioning to organic fertilizers.
• Soil health interventions, including performing soil analyses and soil corrections such as planting multi-species perennial pastures to activate the soil profile at varying depths to maximize carbon sequestration capacity.

In October 2020, we joined the US dairy industry's Net Zero Initiative, which aims to  achieve carbon neutrality, optimize water usage and improve water quality in the industry by 2050. This will be achieved by taking a holistic approach, starting with soil health and its impact on feedstock input for dairy feed. The initiative will also consider water quality and usage, cow care and feeding, farm energy usage and optimal manure handling and usage. It is a multi-stakeholder project involving universities, non-governmental organizations, the US Department of Agriculture and Dairy Checkoff-supported organizations. We are assisting the initiative with a contribution of USD 2 million (CHF 1.8 million) over five years and will be involved in project identification. We will leverage our own supplier base as part of the project testing protocol, with carbon reductions achieved through the project contributing to our wider GHG reduction commitments in the US.

Incorporating certain varieties of plantain into a cow’s diet has been shown to reduce the nitrogen concentration in their urine, reducing the leaching of this element through soil into groundwater. Nestlé and our supplier Fonterra have teamed up with DairyNZ to expand a promising plantain trial to improve the quality of waterways and reduce on-farm GHG emissions.

DairyNZ has been leading the Tararua Plantain Project, working with farmers in the lower North Island of New Zealand. Nestlé and Fonterra are now helping expand the project further through additional funding and by sharing expertise.

Learn more about the Tararua Plantain Project.

Methane produced during digestion, known as enteric fermentation, is the most challenging source of GHG emissions to mitigate in cattle. In response, in October 2020, we launched a new R&D Accelerator to drive innovation in sustainable dairy products. Our Nestlé Research Center is also expanding its exploration of solutions to reduce methane production in cows. This will help ensure milk becomes a key part of our climate solution.

We have also been working with our supplier Barry Callebaut. Partnering with US dairy co-operatives and farmers, we piloted a feed additive containing Agolin, which is made from plant essential oils, to reduce methane emissions from cattle. Certified by the Carbon Trust, scientific studies have documented the potential for this product to reduce enteric emissions. In 2020, 7 farms and nearly 2400 cows benefited from this program.

Farmer-led watershed groups offer a platform for farmers to share best practices, collaborate on optimal solutions to improve overall conservation outcomes and lessen the ecological footprint of agriculture. In support of this work, Nestlé and US-based supplier Grande Cheese are working with the Dairy Strong Sustainability Alliance (DSSA). The DSSA serves as a hub to connect farmers, processors and brands to resources that will help move them forward on their sustainability journey.

Our collaboration focused on assisting the development of a framework for farm-level sustainability projects, supporting farmers to use the Field to Market tool, which was developed by the Alliance for Sustainable Agriculture. The alliance is a collaborative initiative committed to continually improving agricultural value chains to protect the environment.

We are also supporting a watershed pilot project to track the overall impact of refined conservation practices. In 2020, the pilot was initiated with a group of farmers who began capturing the necessary watershed data. Moving forward, other farmer-led groups will launch similar programs, with outcomes measured, analyzed and reported.

In 2019 and 2020, Nestlé, together with supplier Hilmar Cheese Company and the California Dairy Research Foundation, supported a proof-of-concept project conducted by the University of California Extension. The project analyzed the benefits of using sugar beets as a high-quality dairy feed to improve nutrient and water efficiency, measured yields of sugar beets produced as a winter feed and evaluated the key quality aspects of sugar beet roots and almond hull silage. Education sessions were then held to share the results with the local dairy community. This project will help the California dairy industry better comply with several Dairy Sustainability Framework goals, especially improved soil nutrient management and increased water use efficiency in feed production. Adding a new crop species will also promote biodiversity. The goal of the project is to develop a practical, effective solution for farmers based on the principle that nutrients and water can be best managed successfully across a multi-year cropping system rather than crop by crop.

We recognize and share our stakeholders’ concerns about the welfare of animals raised for food and the need to ensure sustainable animal production systems. Through our Responsible Sourcing Standard (pdf, 2.4Mb) and the Nestlé Commitment on Farm Animal Welfare (pdf, 1.4 Mb), we are helping bring about positive change throughout our supply chains. We are dedicated to eliminating  practices from our global supply chain  that are not consistent with the internationally accepted Five Freedoms (pdf, 1Mb). In the case of dairy, we focus specifically on eliminating:

• Painful practices, such as tail docking, dehorning and disbudding without the use of anesthesia and analgesia.
• Confinement practices, such as permanent tethering.
• The irresponsible use of antibiotics, in line with World Organisation for Animal Health guidance.

In recent years, we have contributed to the stakeholder consultation process on the Business Benchmark on Farm Animal Welfare. This global measure of animal welfare standards in food companies is also supported by nonprofits World Animal Protection and Compassion in World Farming. In the 2019 report (published in February 2020), Nestlé was recognized for its efforts to progress animal welfare. We were ranked in the Tier 2 category for the first time, with animal welfare ‘integral to business strategy'. This is significant progress against our previous Tier 3 ranking (‘established but work to be done’) and is mainly the result of greater transparency. Find out more about what Nestlé is doing to improve animal welfare on farms and through our dedicated Nestlé Farm Animal Welfare Q&A (pdf, 0.3Mb).

A pilot scheme launched in Brazil in 2019 is providing new information on the health and wellbeing of dairy cows. Sensors – the bovine equivalent of a Fitbit – are placed on cows’ necks and provide farmers with 24/7 data on their animals’ condition and behavior: how much time they spend moving or resting, when and how often they eat or ruminate, their energy levels, when they are going to be ready for mating and more. The sensors can even indicate potential health issues 24 hours before they show up in the milk supply. This is when a vet would traditionally be able to make a diagnosis.

The sensors have been tested successfully and are enabling farmers to see increases in yields and incomes because of reduced stress in the cows.