PepsiCo to Be Challenged Over Animal Abuse in Its Sugar Supply Chain at Shareholder Meeting
For Immediate Release:
May 4, 2026
Contact:
Alex Payne 202-483-7382
‘Cut the Bull!’ That’s the cry PepsiCo executives will hear in its virtual annual shareholder meeting on Wednesday, as shareholder PETA will present a resolution calling out the contradiction between PepsiCo’s animal welfare policy and torture devices used on bulls in its sugar supply chain. PepsiCo claims that “animals deserve lives free from physical and mental suffering,” yet it has failed to take any action to stop the well-documented abuse of bulls in its sourcing of sugar from India, where the animals are beaten, whipped, and forced to haul overloaded sugarcane carts for long distances in extreme heat, causing some to collapse and die. PETA supporters will also protest outside PepsiCo’s headquarters to demand that the company adopt animal-free harvesting methods, with signs that read “PepsiCo: Stop Abusing Bulls for Sugar.”
In February, after PETA Foundation attorneys filed a lawsuit challenging PepsiCo’s attempt to block this shareholder resolution, the company reversed course within a day—allowing the proposal to be presented to shareholders.
“PepsiCo must ensure its supply chain isn’t built on the backs of exhausted, abused bulls who have metal spikes attached to their necks and are whipped, beaten, and worked to death for its sugary drinks,” says PETA Founder Ingrid Newkirk. “PETA is calling on PepsiCo to honor its own animal welfare policy by requiring sugarcane suppliers to switch to humane, modern, animal-free methods that are already readily available.”
Where: PepsiCo Headquarters, 700 Anderson Hill Road, Purchase (at the intersection of Anderson Hill Road and Brigid Flanagan Drive)
When: Wednesday, May 6, 8 a.m.
Why: PepsiCo’s Indian bottling partner is part of an industry where bulls are beaten and whipped as they struggle to pull carts illegally overloaded with up to 8,000 pounds of sugarcane under the blazing sun, without rest or water. Many are left with bloody gashes on their faces from barbed-wire spikes that rip into their skin if they “disobey” by turning their heads, restrained with nose ropes that tear their nasal septa, and collapse from exhaustion. Some are worked to death and left where they fall.
PETA brought this abuse to the attention of PepsiCo’s leadership earlier this year—noting that it violates the company’s Global Policy on Animal Welfare—but the company has failed to act even when humane solutions exist, including eco-tractors that can replace multiple bulls and improve production efficiency.
PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to abuse in any way”—points out that when it comes to the ability to feel pain, hunger, and thirst, a bull is a dog is a boy. For more information, please visit PETA.org or follow PETA on X, Facebook, or Instagram.
