Cargill is a company of superlatives, and a company with many unique qualities. It is one of the largest food companies in the world; the nation's largest grain trader; and the world's largest privately held corporation. 90,000 employees work at hundreds of processing plants for various food and feed products, scattered all over the nation and in over 50 other countries. Its subsidiaries include Excel, one of the largest meat packing and processing companies in the world, Cargill Steel, which operates 19 steel plants in the United States, and Cargill Salt, one of the largest salt producers in the country.