| ITEM 2. | PROPERTIES |
Our corporate headquarters and principal research and
development facilities are located in Battle Creek, Michigan.
We operated, as of February 22, 2008, manufacturing plants and distribution and warehousing facilities
totaling more than 28 million square feet of building area
in the United States and other countries. Our plants have been
designed and constructed to meet our specific production
requirements, and we periodically invest money for capital and
technological improvements. At the time of its selection, each
location was considered to be favorable, based on the location
of markets, sources of raw materials, availability of suitable
labor, transportation facilities, location of our other plants
producing similar products, and other factors. Our manufacturing
facilities in the United States include four cereal plants and
warehouses located in Battle Creek, Michigan; Lancaster,
Pennsylvania; Memphis, Tennessee; and Omaha, Nebraska and other
plants in San Jose, California; Atlanta, Augusta, Columbus,
and Rome, Georgia; Chicago, Illinois; Kansas City, Kansas;
Florence, Louisville, and Pikeville, Kentucky; Grand Rapids and
Wyoming, Michigan; Blue Anchor, New Jersey; Cary and Charlotte,
North Carolina; Cincinnati, Fremont, and Zanesville, Ohio;
Muncy, Pennsylvania; Rossville, Tennessee; Clearfield, Utah; and
Allyn, Washington.
Outside the United States, we had, as of February 22, 2008,
additional manufacturing locations, some with warehousing
facilities, in Australia, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Ecuador,
Germany, Great Britain, Guatemala, India, Japan, Mexico, Russia,
South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Thailand, and Venezuela.
We generally own our principal properties, including our major
office facilities, although some manufacturing facilities are
leased, and no owned property is subject to any major lien or
other encumbrance. Distribution facilities (including related
warehousing facilities) and offices of non-plant locations
typically are leased. In general, we consider our facilities,
taken as a whole, to be suitable,
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adequate, and of sufficient capacity for our current operations.
