PepsiCo Iowa Sustainable Sourcing for High Fructose Corn Supply Chain and Climate Smart Project
A sustainability impact project to make progress in reducing absolute green house gas emmissions in PepsiCo’s value chain by 20% by 2030 . PepsiCo and Cargill aim to partner with local farmers to deliver sustainable growth and positive impact through partnerships, education programs and best practice sharing. In this project; PepsiCo and Cargill are working with a local NGO on a sustainable sourcing program that involves recruiting farmers who sell corn to Cargill at Cargill’s facility in Eddyville, Iowa to plant cover crops on any cropland. The objectives of the partnership are to increase farmer’s adoption of winter cover crops through which farmers better manage nutrients, build soil health, control weeds, reduce soil erosion and improve water quality for a more resilient sourcing-shed on Midwest farms resulting in more than 1.2 mil t CO2-eq/year through reduced GHG source emissions.
Engagement Targets
Notes: (1) Minor fluctuations in the number of retained growers is expected from year to year. These fluctuations may be due to year-over-year crop rotation effects or other factors beyond the control of the project. Enrolled acres represent the total number of acres on an individual farm in a specific year. The ability to report enrolled acres is based on the Fieldprint Project Standard requirement that individual growers enrolled in projects enter at least 10% of the acres managed for a specific crop. (2) Entered acres represent the actual number of enrolled acres for which data is entered in the Fieldprint Platform for analysis.
Objectives
- PFI paid on 29,000 cover crops acres from farmers selling corn into the Eddyville, Iowa supply chain, surpassing our target for 2023 by 8%. In 2023 we recruited 214 farmers between June and December who sold into the Eddyville and Blair supply chains. Of those, 197 farmers were paid for their cover crops.
- In 2023, we once again saw our intervention treatment, cover crops, trending slightly higher, on average, in greenhouse gas emissions per acre than our baseline of no cover crops. Due to the large amount of variation that we see across our sample population in emissions (see figure where bar level indicates average and dots indicate field-level data), we cannot report that the differences between average emissions are due to cover crops alone. However, when we consider an estimate of carbon sequestration, roughly 1100 lbs. of CO2e per acre, then we do see that cover crops significantly benefit emissions.
- Practical Farmers of Iowa (PFI) continued its cover crop cost-share program with Cargill and PepsiCo as funding partners in 2024. Recruitment goals for the program have remained the same as prior years with 29,000 paid cover crop acres for farmers selling corn into Eddyville, Iowa supply chain.
- In 2024 we recruited 133 farmers between June and December who sold into the Eddyville supply chain. Of those, 123 farmers were paid for their cover crops. The most common reason why farmers did not complete the program was that they did not plant cover crops in fall 2024 or they decided to enroll in a different carbon program. Total acres funded are slightly over target, given the higher-than-normal program. Eddyville acres came in near target with 29,046 acres of cover crops.
- Three farmers were new to the program in 2024, illustrating that the vast majority of participants were alumni of the PepsiCo-Cargill cost-share. This program continues to attract and retain experienced cover croppers: only 3 of the 180 paid participants (2%) had one year or less experience with cover crops.
- Though we typically report biometrics together for Cargill’s and PepsiCo projects for the Blair, Nebraska and Eddyville, IA supply chains, this year we saw different results in the Eddyville vs the Blair supply sheds. In Eddyville (central and southeast Iowa primarily) we saw lower overall emissions and higher corn yields with cover crops (although neither was statistically significant). There were also statistically improved biodiversity scores, soil carbon and soil conservation indices. In the Blair (western IA and eastern NE) supply chain, on the other hand, we saw higher emissions and yields on the corn fields without cover crops (emissions, again, were not statistically significant). Interestingly, the emissions for both regions were in the same ballpark (3,430 – 3,570 lbs. CO2e per acre). Emissions are closely tied to fertilizer. In the Eddyville region we saw lower fertilizer put on cover cropped fields, while the opposite is true with Blair.
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In 2025, we recruited 727 farmers between June and December who sold into the Cargill supply chains. Of those, 638 farmers were paid for their cover crops on 281,000 acres. Specifically 21,834 acres of cover crops were in the Eddyville, IA supply chain. In 2025, 105 farmers in Cargill’s supply chain were new to the program, illustrating that the vast majority of participants were alumni of the 2024 cost-share. Of the program alumni, 62% hold long-term contracts. In 2025, PFI did not recruit as many farmers in the Eddyville and Blair areas as was hoped, but the Des Moines supply chain made up the difference to meet the overall acre goal. In 2026, PFI will consider more targeted recruitment in these two under-performing supply chains.
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Farmers reported planting an average of 60% of their farmed acres to cover crops this year, an increase of nearly 10% from last year. Twenty-two percent of program participants reported an increase in cover crop acreage as a result of the PFI cost-share program. Mean cover crop acres per contract was 348, but the median was 198 acres, due to a few very large contracts raising the mean.
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Practical Farmers reported two greenhouse gas indicators to Cargill: “GHG” (which incorporates modeled soil carbon changes) and “GHG without soil carbon removals” (which isolates emissions from fertilizer use, field operations, and other management activities). This distinction helps explain whether improvements are driven by direct emissions reductions, soil carbon dynamics, or a combination of both. For both Blair and Eddyville supply chain, the 2020-2025 data clearly show that the use of cover crops increases gross GHG emissions, but the use of cover crops increases carbon sequestration for a net reduction in GHG emissions. For the 2025 Eddyville supply chain, PFI saw modeled cover fields 1 lbs. CO2e/bushel GHG emissions compared to the control fields of 5 lbs. CO2e/bushel. This differs when looking at GHG without soil carbon removals, where cover cropped fields saw emissions of 15 lbs. CO2e/bushel compared to the control fields with 14 lbs. CO2e/bushel.