Interview with Murat Tarakçıoğlu, CEO of Cargill Food Solutions

In this interview, Murat Tarakçıoğlu, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Cargill Food Solutions META, answered our questions. Providing information about Cargill's sustainability approach and innovative products, Tarakçıoğlu explained the 1000 Farmers 1000 Prosperity Program. [caption id="attachment_157173" align="aligncenter"] Cargill Food Solutions META Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Murat Tarakçıoğlu[/caption]

Could you briefly tell our readers about yourself, your education and professional background?

I was born in Istanbul in 1970. After graduating from Saint Benoit High School, I completed my education in Business Administration at Boğaziçi University. Following my first work experience at Ernst & Young, I joined Cargill's Finance Department in 1996 as a financial affairs assistant. Over the years, I have worked in various positions in finance, trade and marketing. Since 2005, I have served as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Cargill Food Solutions META (Turkey, Middle East and Africa).

Can you provide information about Cargill's history and current structure? When did Cargill begin operations in Turkey?

Cargill is an innovative food and bio-industrial company that has been working for 158 years to provide safe, responsible and sustainable nutrition for the world. Operating in more than 70 countries with more than 160,000 employees worldwide, we provide sustainable innovative products, services and solutions to our customers across many sectors—from food to textiles, construction to bio-industrial products, pharmaceuticals to personal care products. Our story in Turkey began in the 1960s. On our journey as a food company, we grew through our investments and expanded our product portfolio beyond food. We have increased our investments every year and continuously renewed our commitment to Turkey and our employees' success. Along with food, we continue on our path with our investments in bio-industry and animal feed and our rich product portfolio. With more than 650 employees, we manage our operations in Turkey as well as the Middle East and Africa from our headquarters office in Istanbul. At our facilities in Bursa, Balıkesir, Kocaeli and Sakarya, we produce plant-based raw materials for our customers in the food and bio-industry sectors for use in many products ranging from biscuits to soups, from pharmaceuticals to paper towels, from clothing to shopping bags.

"With our production capacity featuring high use of domestic raw materials, we rank among the top international investor companies"

In short, we touch every area of life. With our production capacity featuring high use of domestic raw materials, we rank among the top international investor companies. With our continuously evolving and developing structure, we are no longer just a content supplier—we now provide our customers with fully integrated food ingredient portfolios and solutions. We aim to be the primary source of inspiration that enables our customers to grow and produce innovative solutions.

Can you provide information about your products, particularly within the agriculture and food industries?

We have a wide product portfolio in every area of the food industry with innovative and sustainable products to meet our customers' needs. We develop innovative food ingredients to enable the production of healthier versions of foods frequently consumed in daily life. Our corn fiber, pea protein, vegan chocolate, reduced-sugar chocolate and high-oleic sunflower oil are used in the production of healthier snacks. We bring our plant-based oils, which hold an important place in food, to our customers under the Turyağ brand. Our Turyağ brand, which brings healthier, higher-performance and innovative products to the industrial and out-of-home consumption market, produces next-generation edible plant-based oils free of trans fats and cholesterol and with reduced saturated fatty acids, supporting the production of healthier foods. Additionally, in the HoReCa (Hotel, Restaurant, Cafe) sector, we are addressing changing needs and expectations with our new brand PROVERSE. PROVERSE, which brings professional kitchens together with high performance and quality, has a journey that began with cooking cream and whipped cream and will soon expand with products such as vegan burger patties and ice cream bases.

Can you provide information about your approach to sustainability and environmental issues and the activities you carry out in these areas? What are the characteristics of the 1000 Farmers 1000 Prosperity Program and what kind of work are you carrying out within this scope?

For Cargill, whose global vision is to value and create value for society, the environment and nature wherever it operates, sustainability is at the foundation of all our business strategies. We view creating sustainable sources, ensuring efficiency in production and distribution, and supporting the communities where we live and work as the most fundamental requirements for healthy growth. Our teams are at the forefront of building a more sustainable food system and aim to do the right thing at every step of the value chain. We shape our understanding of sustainability by focusing on three main areas: Climate, Land and Water; and People. Globally, we have set targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions across all our operations by 10% by 2025 and by 30% per ton of product sold in our supply chain by 2030. Another key commitment is strengthening women's participation in the workforce. As part of our global "Diversity, Equity and Inclusion" strategy, we are committed to increasing the proportion of female executives in Cargill's management positions to 50% by 2050. The 1000 Farmers 1000 Prosperity Program is one of our corporate responsibility programs that is the extension of our global commitment to touch 10 million farmers by 2030 in Turkey. Since 2019, we have been working to improve the livelihoods of farmers and the productivity of their products, support social and digital transformation in agriculture, and contribute to the widespread adoption of sustainable methods in the field. Our program is now in its fifth season and has reached more than 5,000 farmers across 18 provinces in Turkey. We offer farmers free field-specific training, advisory services and access to digital farming tools. This year we have focused on regenerative agriculture. In this context, farmers can follow special irrigation, fertilization and spraying practices that help reduce disease risk in their fields and prevent soil pollution while protecting water resources. Additionally, farmers can identify threatening pests using PestTrap (Digital Pest Trap) without going to the field and make spraying decisions. The 1000 Farmers 1000 Prosperity Program, Turkey's first corporate responsibility program to conduct social impact research and measurement in agriculture and food, has enabled participating farmers to achieve yield increases of up to 20% over the past four years. Starting in 2021, we regularly conduct the "Change in Farmers" research with KONDA Research to assess the impacts of the program. To understand the social impact of our program, convert it into financial value and report it, we utilize the internationally recognized Social Return on Investment (SROI) Guide of "Social Value International," while implementing our processes in this area with our solution partner Ernst & Young Turkey. As the first and only agriculture and food program in Turkey to conduct this impact analysis, we have concluded that our TRY 1 investment yielded TRY 2.53 in social return in 2019, TRY 2.78 in 2020 and TRY 3.03 in 2021. In 2022, we provided TRY 3.23 in social benefits for every TRY 1 invested. The 40 awards we have received nationally and internationally also reflect another dimension of the program's success. Also, as the local extension of our commitment to increase the proportion of female executives in Cargill's management positions to 50% by 2050, we launched the Women Leaders of Tomorrow Program with Turkish Education Foundation (TEV) in 2021. Through this program, we not only provide scholarships to university students eligible to receive scholarships from TEV, but also stand as a source of strength in our students' professional and personal journeys. [caption id="attachment_157171" align="aligncenter"] Bursa/Orhangazi Corn Processing Facility[/caption]

Can you provide information about your innovation and R&D activities?

As Cargill, we conduct R&D work on a global scale to meet the increasing food needs while protecting our planet and natural resources. Beyond being a food company, we want to be the primary source of inspiration and growth for our customers' innovative and sustainable production. We focus on producing healthy, lower carbon footprint, delicious, convenient and pleasurable-to-consume food ingredients. To accomplish this, we monitor trends in society and invest in our research, innovation, formulation and supply chain capabilities. In Turkey, we also produce food ingredients from an innovative perspective to meet demands in line with trends toward conscious, healthy and convenient food and beverages. With the INFUSE Application Center we launched last year at our Orhangazi Corn Processing Facility and our pilot facility, we provide technical support and product development services to food customers who primarily want to develop innovative products and even plant-based solutions in the dairy and dairy products sector. On the other hand, demand for plant-based proteins is increasing, and we see that plant-based sources that can be produced with less water, such as the pea protein in our portfolio, are increasingly preferred. In our bio-industrial business segment, in line with our vision focused on sustainable products, we continue our efforts to expand our product portfolio that provides bio-based, non-toxic and renewable solutions for use in many sectors such as energy, paints, furniture, textiles and packaging. FR3®, a bio-based transformer oil that is a product of Cargill's strategy to develop plant-oil-based solutions as an alternative to old technology used in the energy sector, has been produced at our facility in Turkey since 2018. Used millions of times in transformers of different capacities and voltages worldwide for more than 30 years, FR3® has proven to perform far better than mineral transformer oils. While increasing transformer capacity, it extends its lifespan. It also maximizes fire safety by reducing the possibility of transformer explosion to zero. FR3®, produced from 98% renewable bio-based oils and having 98% lower carbon footprint compared to petroleum-based oils, degrades in 28 days when it leaks into the soil and does not harm living organisms.

Does Cargill have investment plans for Turkey in the upcoming period, and if so, what are they?

With our confidence in Turkey's production and growth potential, we increase our technology investments and R&D activities every year. At the same time, by contributing to our country's economy, we create export opportunities to markets around the world. We will continue to provide solutions that meet our customers' needs with our global and regional supply chain, and continue to invest in sustainable products and production.