Cross-sector action to protect the Upper Mississippi River Basin

The Gulf of Mexico dead zone, at the mouth of the Mississippi River, is one of the largest dead zones in the world, covering approximately 5,500 square miles*. As a major source for the seafood industry, this dead zone creates significant risks for the regional fishing industry and the economies of the states with coastlines adjacent to the dead zone. In 2014, Monsanto, which was acquired by Bayer in 2018 and is now part of the company’s Crop Science Division, began working with Cargill, Environmental Defense Fund, General Mills, Kellogg Company, Land O’Lakes, McDonald’s, PepsiCo, The Nature Conservancy, Unilever, Walmart, and World Wildlife Fund, to build a broad partnership in Illinois, Iowa, and Nebraska – some of the major farming states in the United States whose watersheds drain into the Mississippi River Basin.