General Mills wins Ron Brown award

GOLDEN VALLEY (AP) -- President Clinton honored General Mills on Thursday for its part in establishing Siyeza Inc., a soul food processing plant in north Minneapolis.

General Mills, based in Golden Valley, was one of five corporations named winners of the Ron Brown Award for Corporate Leadership by Commerce Secretary William Daley and Labor Secretary Alexis Herman.

The award is named for the former Commerce secretary killed in a plane crash in Croatia in 1996.

Executives of GTE, Hewlett-Packard, IBM and U S West received the other awards. The companies were chosen from more than 600 candidates.

Siyeza is a joint venture of General Mills, Glory Foods and the Stairstep Initiative with additional financing from U.S. Bancorp.