Exhibit 99

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

September 21, 2016

Contact: (analysts) Jeff Siemon: 763-764-2301

(media) Bridget Christenson: 763-764-6364

GENERAL MILLS REPORTS FISCAL 2017 FIRST-QUARTER RESULTS

MINNEAPOLIS, MINN.—-General Mills (NYSE: GIS) today reported results for the first quarter ended August 28, 2016.

“Our first-quarter profit margin expansion and EPS results reflect continued good progress on our productivity and cost-savings initiatives,” said General Mills Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Ken Powell. “However, our net sales performance did not meet our expectations due to the challenging macro environment, a difficult year-over-year comparison, and a slower start to the year on certain businesses. We are taking actions to improve our net sales performance going forward, leveraging our Consumer First focus. At the same time, we have a number of encouraging examples across our global portfolio where our efforts to adapt to evolving consumer interests are driving positive results.”

First Quarter Results Summary

Operating Segment Results

U.S. Retail Segment

First-quarter net sales for General Mills’ U.S. Retail segment totaled $2.33 billion, down 8 percent from the prior year with an increase in the Snacks operating unit more than offset by declines in the other units. Organic net sales declined 5 percent. Annie’s and Lärabar natural and organic products, Nature Valley cereals, and Old El Paso Mexican products posted particularly strong results in the quarter, offset by declines in Yoplait yogurt and Progresso soup. Segment operating profit declined 6 percent from the year-ago period that saw a 38 percent profit increase.

International Segment

First-quarter net sales for General Mills’ International segment totaled $1.13 billion, down 6 percent from the prior year driven primarily by foreign exchange headwinds and the divestiture of Green Giant in Canada. On a constant-currency basis, net sales increases in the Latin America and Asia/Pacific regions were offset by declines in Europe and Canada. Organic net sales declined 1 percent from year-ago levels that increased 5 percent. Products contributing particularly strong results in the quarter included Yoplait yogurt and Wanchai Ferry frozen meals in China, Old El Paso Mexican products in Canada and Yoki snacks in Brazil, offset by declines in Europe on Häagen-Dazs ice cream and Yoplait yogurt. International segment operating profit declined 14 percent as reported and 11 percent in constant currency, reflecting currency-driven inflation on products imported into Canada and the U.K., as well as the Green Giant divestiture.

Convenience Stores and Foodservice Segment

First-quarter net sales for the Convenience Stores and Foodservice segment declined 7 percent to $446 million, primarily due to market index pricing on bakery flour, partially offset by increases for the yogurt, biscuits, and cereal platforms. Organic net sales were also down 7 percent. Segment operating profit increased 16 percent in the quarter, reflecting lower input costs and higher grain merchandising earnings.

Joint Venture Summary

Combined after-tax earnings from the Cereal Partners Worldwide (CPW) and Häagen-Dazs Japan (HDJ) joint ventures were $24 million compared to $26 million a year ago. On a constant-currency basis, after-tax earnings from joint ventures declined 10 percent. Net sales for CPW grew 1 percent in constant currency, and constant-currency net sales for HDJ essentially matched year-ago results that were up 9 percent.

Other Income Statement Items

Unallocated corporate items totaled $82 million net expense in the first quarter of fiscal 2017, compared to $83 million net expense in 2016. Excluding mark-to-market valuation effects and other items affecting comparability, unallocated corporate items totaled $37 million net expense this year compared to $51 million net expense a year ago.

Restructuring, impairment, and other exit costs totaled $59 million in 2017 compared to $60 million in 2016. An additional $27 million of restructuring and project-related charges were recorded in cost of sales this year compared to $35 million a year ago (please see Note 3 below for more information on these charges).

Net interest expense totaled $74 million in this year’s first quarter, compared to $75 million a year ago. The effective tax rate was 30.9 percent in the first quarter, compared to 32.7 percent last year (please see Note 6 below for more information on our effective tax rate). Excluding items affecting comparability, the adjusted effective tax rate of 31.4 percent was below the rate of 32.3 percent a year ago, driven by discrete state tax benefits and favorable impacts of U.S. federal legislation passed in fiscal 2016.

Cash Flow Generation and Cash Returns

Cash provided by operating activities totaled $288 million, down 33 percent from the prior year primarily due to the timing of accounts payable, changes in trade and advertising accruals, and changes in income taxes payable. Capital investments in the first quarter totaled $154 million. General Mills paid $291 million in dividends, an increase of 9 percent over last year’s first quarter. The company repurchased 5.6 million shares of common stock for a total of $400 million. Average diluted shares outstanding for the first quarter declined 1 percent to 612 million.

Outlook

Powell said, “We expect our organic net sales performance will improve over the remainder of the year as key Consumer First initiatives gain traction and as our prior-year comparisons ease. At the same time, our commitment to our Growth and Foundation portfolio segmentation – and our progress on Holistic Margin Management and our other cost savings initiatives – gives us good visibility to achieving our previously announced profit goals for fiscal 2017 as well as our target of 20 percent adjusted operating profit margin by fiscal 2018.”

General Mills reiterated its key fiscal 2017 targets, including:

General Mills will hold a briefing for investors today, September 21, 2016, beginning at 8:30 a.m. Eastern time. You may access the webcast from General Mills’ internet home page: generalmills.com.

This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 that are based on our current expectations and assumptions. These forward-looking statements, including the statements under the caption “Outlook,” and statements made by Mr. Powell, are subject to certain risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from the potential results discussed in the forward-looking statements. In particular, our predictions about future net sales and earnings could be affected by a variety of factors, including: competitive dynamics in the consumer foods industry and the markets for our products, including new product introductions, advertising activities, pricing actions, and promotional activities of our competitors; economic conditions, including changes in inflation rates, interest rates, tax rates, or the availability of capital; product development and innovation; consumer acceptance of new products and product improvements; consumer reaction to pricing actions and changes in promotion levels; acquisitions or dispositions of businesses or assets; changes in capital structure; changes in the legal and regulatory environment, including labeling and advertising regulations and litigation; impairments in the carrying value of goodwill, other intangible assets, or other long-lived assets, or changes in the useful lives of other intangible assets; changes in accounting standards and the impact of significant accounting estimates; product quality and safety issues, including recalls and product liability; changes in consumer demand for our products; effectiveness of advertising, marketing, and promotional programs; changes in consumer behavior, trends, and preferences, including weight loss trends; consumer perception of health-related issues, including obesity; consolidation in the retail environment; changes in purchasing and inventory levels of significant customers; fluctuations in the cost and availability of supply chain resources, including raw materials, packaging, and energy; disruptions or inefficiencies in the supply chain; effectiveness of restructuring and cost savings initiatives; volatility in the market value of derivatives used to manage price risk for certain commodities; benefit plan expenses due to changes in plan asset values and discount rates used to determine plan liabilities; failure or breach of our information technology systems; foreign economic conditions, including currency rate fluctuations; and political unrest in foreign markets and economic uncertainty due to terrorism or war. The company undertakes no obligation to publicly revise any forward-looking statement to reflect any future events or circumstances.

Consolidated Statements of Earnings and Supplementary Information

GENERAL MILLS, INC. AND SUBSIDIARIES

(Unaudited) (In Millions, Except per Share Data)

See accompanying notes to consolidated financial statements.

Operating Segment Results and Supplementary Information

GENERAL MILLS, INC. AND SUBSIDIARIES

(Unaudited) (In Millions)

See accompanying notes to consolidated financial statements.

Consolidated Balance Sheets

GENERAL MILLS, INC. AND SUBSIDIARIES

(In Millions, Except Par Value)

See accompanying notes to consolidated financial statements.

Consolidated Statements of Cash Flows

GENERAL MILLS, INC. AND SUBSIDIARIES

(Unaudited) (In Millions)

See accompanying notes to consolidated financial statements.

GENERAL MILLS, INC. AND SUBSIDIARIES

NOTES TO CONSOLIDATED FINANCIAL STATEMENTS

(Unaudited)

In the first quarter of fiscal 2017, we announced a plan to restructure certain product lines in our International segment. To eliminate excess capacity, we will close our snacks manufacturing facility in Marília, Brazil and cease production operations for meals and snacks at our facility in São Bernardo do Campo, Brazil. We will also cease production of certain underperforming snack products at our facility in Nanjing, China. These and other actions, which are subject to appropriate consultation with employees and their representatives where required by law or practice, will affect approximately 420 positions in our Brazilian operations and approximately 440 positions in our Greater China operations. In the first quarter of fiscal 2017, we recorded $36 million of these charges, including $2 million of severance charges and $34 million of impairment charges to write down assets to their net realizable value. We expect these actions to be completed by the end of fiscal 2017 with total charges of approximately $43 million, of which approximately $8 million will be cash.

In the first quarter of fiscal 2017, we approved a plan to close our Vineland, New Jersey facility to eliminate excess soup capacity in our U.S. Retail Segment supply chain. This action will affect approximately 370 positions, and we recorded a charge of $21 million, including $12 million of severance charges and $7 million of accelerated depreciation in the first quarter of fiscal 2017. We expect to record approximately $27 million of additional expense in fiscal 2017, primarily accelerated depreciation. We expect this action to be completed by the end of fiscal 2019 with total charges of approximately $66 million, of which approximately $23 million will be cash.

In addition to the actions taken at certain facilities described above, we incurred $15 million of restructuring charges in the first quarter of fiscal 2017 and $82 million in the first quarter of fiscal 2016 relating to Project Century and Project Compass actions previously announced.

We made cash payments totaling $16 million in the first quarter of fiscal 2017 and $34 million in the first quarter of fiscal 2016 relating to restructuring initiatives.

In addition to restructuring charges, we recorded project-related costs of $14 million in the first quarter of fiscal 2017 and $13 million in the first quarter of fiscal 2016. We expect to incur approximately $38 million of project-related costs in future periods related to our restructuring initiatives.

Details of our current restructuring initiatives were as follows:

Organic net sales growth rates, diluted EPS excluding certain items affecting comparability and the related growth rate on a constant-currency basis, and total segment operating profit and related constant-currency growth rates are used in reporting to our executive management and as a component of our Board of Directors’ measurement of our performance for incentive compensation purposes. We believe that these measures provide useful supplemental information to assess our operating performance. The adjustments are either items resulting from infrequently occurring events or items that, in our management’s judgment, significantly affect the period-over-period assessment of operating results. These measures are reconciled below to the measures as reported in accordance with GAAP, and should be viewed in addition to, and not in lieu of, our diluted EPS and operating performance measures as calculated in accordance with GAAP.

We provide organic net sales growth rates for our consolidated net sales and segment net sales. We believe that organic net sales growth rates provide useful information to investors because they provide transparency to underlying performance in our net sales by excluding the effect that foreign currency exchange rate fluctuations, as well as acquisitions, divestitures, and a 53^rd week, when applicable, have on year-to-year comparability. A reconciliation of these measures to reported net sales growth rates, which are the relevant GAAP measures, is included in our Operating Segment Results above.

Certain measures in this release are presented excluding the impact of foreign currency exchange (constant-currency). To present this information, current period results for entities reporting in currencies other than United States dollars are translated into United States dollars at the average exchange rates in effect during the corresponding period of the prior fiscal year, rather than the actual average exchange rates in effect during the current fiscal year. Therefore, the foreign currency impact is equal to current year results in local currencies multiplied by the change in the average foreign currency exchange rate between the current fiscal period and the corresponding period of the prior fiscal year. We believe that these constant-currency measures provide useful information to investors because they provide transparency to underlying performance by excluding the effect that foreign currency exchange rate fluctuations have on period-to-period comparability given volatility in foreign currency exchange markets.

Diluted EPS excluding certain items affecting comparability and the related constant-currency growth rates follow:

A reconciliation of total segment operating profit to the relevant GAAP measure, operating profit, is included in the Statements of Operating Segment Results.

Constant-currency total segment operating profit growth rate follows:

Constant-currency International segment operating profit growth rate follows:

Constant-currency International segment and region net sales growth rates follow:

The components of International organic net sales growth for the quarter ended August 30, 2015, versus the quarter ended August 24, 2014, are as follows:

Constant-currency after-tax earnings from joint ventures growth rate follows:

Earnings comparisons as a percent of net sales excluding certain items affecting comparability follow:

A reconciliation of the effective income tax rate as reported to the effective income tax rate excluding certain items affecting comparability follows:

The non-GAAP forward-looking financial measures included in this release are not reconcilable to the equivalent GAAP measure because we cannot accurately predict the excluded variables that may impact these measures.