Nestlé: Agricultural Material Sourcing Within the Concept of Creating Shared Value (CSV)

Corporate Head of Agriculture Hans Jöhr's mind raced in anticipation of the executive board meeting that afternoon. Jöhr recognized the meeting as a key opportunity to strategize far into the future, reexamining how his team's efforts in sustainable agricultural sourcing supported Nestlé's position as the world's leading nutrition, health and wellness company. The company had undertaken to impact three of the world's most urgent challenges—nutrition, water and rural development—and Jöhr's team was fundamental to each of these pillars. Yet the forces changing the global food system were formidable: unprecedented levels of hunger, obesity and chronic disease; land degradation, frequent natural disasters, and critical threats to water supply; population growth by the billions in the coming decades, along with increased urbanization; and a volatile and tentative world economy. In the face of such threats and complexity, how could Hans Jöhr ensure that Nestlé's agricultural raw materials were safe, high quality, of consistent supply, and sustainably and ethically and economically produced? How can the procurement process enable the small scale producer to become a viable partner in the milk production models that Nestlé has developed in the developing world? Further, how could his team excel beyond the company's day-to-day business and enable Nestlé's visions for the future?