ARDEN HILLS, MINNESOTA, U.S. — Land O’Lakes SUSTAIN and ingredient supplier Tate & Lyle are collaborating to advance conservation practices on U.S. Midwest farms — specifically in sourcing sustainable corn. The relationship enables Tate & Lyle, a significant user of U.S.-grown corn, to enhance sustainable agriculture by helping corn producers target and measure the impact of their environmental stewardship efforts, using the latest technology.

The collaboration leverages the Truterra Insights Engine, a new interactive on-farm digital platform from Land O’Lakes SUSTAIN, that helps farmers scale their environmental stewardship efforts and assess return-on-investment in real time, acre-by-acre. In turn, the Truterra Insights Engine supports Tate & Lyle to have greater visibility of its environmental footprint beyond the factory gates, enabling the company and its customers to make informed decisions about their supply chain environmental strategies.

“This collaboration bolsters Tate & Lyle’s efforts to increase sustainability throughout the value chain, using the industry-leading Truterra Insights Engine,” said Matt Carstens, senior vice-president of Land O’Lakes SUSTAIN. “Our on-farm conservation practices and technology support a two-pronged approach to sustainability — helping protect natural resources while improving farmer livelihoods. Consumers care deeply about how their food is produced. Land O’Lakes SUSTAIN can aid in implementing specific conservation practices to achieve broader sustainability goals for food companies like Tate & Lyle — and help them demonstrate the results in clear terms.”

Farmers are supported through the Land O’Lakes SUSTAIN agricultural retailer network in the Midwest, including Ceres Solutions, The Equity and Premier Ag. The partnership said that these well-known agricultural retailers are trusted advisers to farmers and are well positioned to provide insights and information to farmers to enable them to make meaningful changes to their ways of working, spreading best practice throughout the farming community.

 “At Tate & Lyle, we recognize our responsibilities when it comes to environmental stewardship and, with this partnership, we are strengthening the sustainability of our agricultural supply chain,” said Jim Stutelberg, president of primary products at Tate & Lyle. “By utilizing the expertise and network of Land O’Lakes SUSTAIN and employing the Truterra Insights Engine, we can build on the great work farmers are already doing to care for the air, land and water and partner and provide greater visibility to drive sustainability in our business.”

The Truterra Insights Engine is designed to facilitate collaboration and impact throughout the industry. The full suite of the Truterra offering uses technology and collaboration to advance the food and agricultural industry’s ability to enable conservation at scale across a variety of crops, commodities and commitments.

“True sustainability starts on the farm,” said Betsy Bower, agronomist at Ceres Solutions, an agricultural retailer in Indiana. “In order to deliver large-scale corporate sustainability commitments, we need to work with the farmer on every acre in a way that works for them and their business. Utilizing the Truterra Insights Engine through partnerships like this one make scalable impact possible. Together, we continuously adapt to improve the delicate balance between productivity, profit and preservation.”