Our approach At General Mills, we are responsible for maintaining high standards not only in our own operations, but also across our value chain. Our supplier base is large, complex and global, with thousands of suppliers in more than 25 countries. Through our Global Responsible Sourcing program, we uphold our Supplier Code of Conduct and drive ongoing supplier progress in the areas of health and safety, human rights, business integrity and the environment. This increases our influence to protect and respect the people who supply, transform and manufacture the goods and services we use to make our products. Audits: We expect all suppliers to uphold our Supplier Code of Conduct, and we use responsible sourcing audits to assess and understand suppliers’ business practices. These audits, which follow the Sedex Members Ethical Trade Audit (SMETA) protocol, are distinct from food safety audits. The SMETA framework is widely recognized by companies across many sectors, which enables suppliers to share audit results with multiple customers to improve efficiency and reduce audit burden. Accredited third-party auditors perform these audits and ensure timely creation of corrective action plans and closure of noncompliances identified within a specified time frame. Due to the challenges of COVID-19, General Mills is accepting virtual SMETA audits in regions where physical audits are not permitted. Owned locations and co-packers: All of our owned manufacturing locations and co-packers are required to conduct a physical audit every three years at a minimum and develop and confirm implementation of a corrective action plan for all noncompliances. During fiscal 2021, 45 of our owned locations and co-packers were audited, representing about 21% of the total. When issues arise in audits or through media alerts, the responsible sourcing team elevates them for visibility and provides regional sourcing leadership with recommendations to close the finding. If needed, visibility is brought to the regional supply chain leader for resolution. Regular progress review is conducted until the issue is resolved. Tier 1 suppliers: Tier 1 direct suppliers (suppliers that provide ingredients used in our food products or packaging) are rated by inherent country and goods risk using external data sources and are segmented into different risk levels. (See box for details.) From fiscal 2018 to fiscal 2020, inherently high-risk Tier 1 direct suppliers were asked to complete a self-assessment questionnaire followed by an audit for the subset of those suppliers identified as highest risk. In fiscal 2021, we shifted management of our audit program to in-house and expanded the scope to additional geographies and business segments. We also simplified our program by eliminating the self-assessment questionnaire and only requiring a SMETA compliant audit to decrease supplier time and resource requirements and improve the effectiveness of the program. All suppliers are expected to comply and participate in the program by submitting a SMETA- compliant audit when requested. Governance and integration: The Chief Procurement Officer leads Global Sourcing with accountability to our Chief Supply Chain Officer who reports to our Responsible sourcing 1990s 2008 2014 2021 General Mills was an early adopter of responsible sourcing and developed a program for manufacturing facilities producing premiums (such as toys included in or on pack) and supplier facilities that license our brands Launched program in our owned locations and co-packer facilities Added more Tier 1 direct materials suppliers in North America and expanded to locations in Asia, Latin America, Europe, and Australia, as well as Blue Buffalo locations in our Pet segment Expanded program to include locations of inherently high-risk Tier 1 direct materials suppliers in North America (suppliers that provide ingredients used in our food products or packaging) Global Responsible Sourcing timeline To segment our Tier 1 suppliers into different risk levels, we consider factors including geography, ingredient category, and the results of prior responsible sourcing audits from around the world, covering health and safety, human rights, business integrity and the environment. The audit-related data sources used include 3,655 SMETA supplier audits, 12,763 ISO 14001 supplier audits and 1,324 SA8000 supplier audits. These 17,742 supplier audits were concentrated in countries with known environmental, social and governance risks, based on public sources including the Yale Performance Index, the Social Progress Global Index, the Worldwide Governance Index and the Corruption Perception Index. Our segmentation, completed in January 2019, was determined based on an aggregation of this data. We selected these data sources to uncover risks as outlined in our Supplier Code of Conduct, focused heavily on human rights and health and safety. Risk-based segmentation GENERAL MILLS GLOBAL RESPONSIBILITY 38 Food Planet People Community