Mars

Practicing Water Stewardship

Ensuring Precious Resources

Water is a critical resource. As global water stress intensifies, we are committed to supporting responsible water stewardship by enhancing water efficiency, reducing usage in our facilities and collaborating with farmers, suppliers and stakeholders to drive collective action. Our Water Stewardship strategy is designed to address water stress where it matters most – focusing on high-risk watersheds, improving water efficiency in agriculture and manufacturing and collaborating with stakeholders to drive systemic change. 

We are working to reduce the gap to sustainable water use across our supply chain, with a focus on crops like rice, almonds, mint, wheat and corn in high-risk regions such as the United States, Spain¹, India, and Pakistan. Since 2015, we have achieved a 36% reduction in the gap to sustainable water use, in our value chain, primarily through efficiency improvements and geographic sourcing choices in our rice and mint supply chains. We recognize the complexity of addressing water stress and continue refining our approach to maximize impact where it is most needed. 

Sustainable Rice Farming with Climate-Smart Practice 

Rice plays an important role in the world’s diet and economic prosperity. It is a daily staple for 3.5 billion people around the world² and provides income to around 19% of the world’s population³. However, traditional rice production is extremely water intensive. As the owner of one of the world’s largest rice brands – Ben’s Original – rice is a critical raw material for the Mars Food & Nutrition segment, so we’re focused on sourcing rice more sustainably. Through our programs around the world, we are working with our rice farmers to implement climate-smart agriculture practices that help reduce water usage and greenhouse gas emissions, while protecting yields for rice farmers. Mars Food & Nutrition is also a proud founding member of the Sustainable Rice Platform(Opens a new window), a global alliance working to promote sustainable rice farming, empowering small holder farmers, and reducing the environmental footprint of rice. 

Collaborating for Collective Water Action

Global collaboration is a driving factor behind our decision to adopt the Alliance for Water Stewardship’s(Opens a new window) universal definition of water stewardship, which emphasizes the socially equitable, environmentally sustainable, and economically beneficial use of water. This approach emphasizes that by understanding their water use, catchment context, and shared concerns, good water stewards engage in meaningful individual and collective actions that benefit people, the economy, and nature.

We are working with partners, including the Alliance for Water Stewardship(Opens a new window), the World Resources Institute(Opens a new window) and the UN CEO Water Mandate’s Water Resilience Coalition(Opens a new window), to preserve the world’s freshwater resources through collective action in water-stressed basins and by setting ambitious, measurable targets.

Learn more in our Water Stewardship Position Statement.