Kraft Foods Human Nutrition Endowment

Description of the Endowment

The Division of Nutritional Sciences is honored and gratified to announce the establishment of a $1 million permanent endowment through a generous gift from Kraft Foods North America. This far-reaching endowment will serve to benefit both the students and faculty in the Division of Nutritional Sciences, through the establishment of the Kraft Foods Human Nutrition Graduate Fellowships, the Kraft Foods Human Nutrition Endowed Professor and the Kraft Foods Human Nutrition Undergraduate Scholarship Program, within the Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition. In addition, the endowment will provide unrestricted support for the programs of the Division that will be earmarked for student use as they pursue professional development opportunities, including travel to scientific conferences and funding for research grants and other training opportunities. Through the establishment of this endowment, Kraft Foods will enable the Division of Nutritional Sciences to recruit and retain the highest quality students and faculty, which will enable us to meet our vision of training the future leaders in our discipline far into the future.

Statement from Kraft Foods

Kraft Foods is proud to establish the Kraft Foods Human Nutrition Endowment at the University of Illinois' Division of Nutritional Sciences. As the largest U.S.-based food company, with headquarters in Illinois, Kraft Foods has a long-standing relationship with the University of Illinois. We have hired over 500 university graduates during the last five years, 100 of them in R&D and Quality alone. We have sponsored or collaborated in various nutrition, food science and engineering research programs, and have supported efforts to improve diversity in the student population.

Our employees represent Kraft Foods and the food industry on a number of the university's external advisory boards. Mary Kay Haben, Group Vice President, Kraft Foods North America and President, Cheese, Meals and Enhancers Group serves on the Business School Advisory Board. Several graduates of the Division of Nutritional Sciences employed at Kraft Foods act as Adjunct Professors in the Division's academic programs. We see the Kraft Foods Human Nutrition Endowment as another step in strengthening the relationship which has been so beneficial.

At Kraft Foods we strive to be recognized as the Undisputed Leader in the food industry as recognized by our consumers, our customers, our employees, our suppliers, our investors and the communities in which we operate. Consistent with our vision of undisputed leadership, we constantly seek opportunities to further the scientific underpinnings of our products, and human nutrition is a large part of that science. We believe the Kraft Foods Human Nutrition Endowment will help to advance that science by opening new areas of human nutrition research, supporting graduate and undergraduate students in human nutrition programs, aiding the Division of Nutritional Sciences to attract and retain the best faculty and students, and fostering efforts to improve diversity of under-represented minority students.

We are excited by this opportunity to further advance our relationship with the University of Illinois through the Kraft Foods Human Nutrition Endowment, and are proud to be a major supporter of the Division of Nutritional Sciences.

John Ruff
  Senior Vice President, Global Quality, Scientific Affairs and Nutrition
Kraft Foods