The materiality analysis process and stakeholder engagement continues to help us integrate sustainability objectives into business planning and external stakeholder relationships.

We don’t see this process as simply a way to improve our report; we see it as an evolutionary step in the way we do business. Every day brings a new opportunity to address and refine these issues. Our culture of curiosity and innovation has always prompted us to ask: “What’s next?” We’re constantly looking for ways to effect positive change.

Through this process, our focus has been refined and changed. And it shouldn’t be a surprise that it will change as we hear more from our internal and external stakeholders. But today, these processes and graphs serve not only as a place to plant our flag, but a window through which others can see our passion and progress.

What’s Next?

Our people believe we have a responsibility and an opportunity to use our resources to address some of the world’s most pressing challenges; however, we only play one part. In order to meet new challenges, we will continue to seek out new partnerships and solutions.

This year, we took an important step by formalizing our materiality and stakeholder engagement processes. We also established a baseline for our seed facilities related to energy and water. Going forward, we will continue to engage with our partners and get input on how we can make the biggest impact in improving lives through agriculture. We will also work with our stakeholders to establish additional projects and goals; both for our own operations and for the work we do with our farmer customers and society.

We communicate these partnerships and goals in this report and also throughout all of our communication channels. Our teams will periodically provide updates on our website, through collaborative engagements and through direct communications to stakeholders.

Finally, while we are proud of the progress we’ve demonstrated with this year’s report, we are committed to continuous improvement in our sustainability reporting. An important area of improvement for us is to work to gain third party assurance for our sustainability report. While a number of programs individually have been verified through third parties, e.g. our Product Safety and Stewardship, Human Rights and certain Environmental, Safety and Health programs, we believe it is a critical part of our commitment to supplying transparent, verifiable information for all material provided in our report. We are working with third party advisors to develop a process for assurance and have begun the pre-assurance steps. This approach allows us to identify any gaps and develop a robust assurance process going forward.