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Courtesy of NAA:

The National Aquaculture Association (NAA) has received credible information that several groups that identify themselves as animal rights organizations are focused on U.S. aquaculture, primarily fish production. Such groups typically produce and distribute images and written or verbal comments to create public revulsion towards animal agriculture.

A frequent tactic is to trigger controversial, negative verbal or visual exchanges by antagonizing farm and business owners, managers and/or employees during farm visits, protests, public events or via social media. The NAA suggests that farms and processing plants re-examine or adopt hiring, farm visitation, and farm security policies to address these tactics to factually present all that you do to nurture your fish and shellfish throughout their lifetime.

For any of the following topics contact your aquaculture extension specialist, aquatic animal veterinarian or aquatic animal health profession, or the NAA for the guidance fact sheets and the template documents identified below.

• Hiring Practices: Screen potential employees carefully. Keep an eye out for any indication of an individual seeking employment in order to advance the agenda of an animal rights group. Conduct searches of prospective employees on social media (Google, Facebook, Twitter, and others). Warning flags include factors that appear unusual for the applicant to be interested in the type or location of the employment. These factors may include: out-of-state driver’s license, telephone number, addresses, references or banks for check deposit without an indication of permanent relocation plans, and clearly over-educated and/or over-qualified applicants. Applicants who exhibit or support a vegan lifestyle are unlikely to have a legitimate interest in a job in aquaculture, so confirm that potential employees have no such reservations. If possible, serve your farm-raised fish or shellfish for lunch. Contact the NAA for guidance entitled, Avoid Hiring a Potential Activist, Creating an Employee Animal Care Agreement or a template Draft Employee Acknowledgement Form.

• Fish Welfare Policy: Develop or review a farm/company animal welfare policy to share with the public. Contact the NAA for guidance entitled, Creating a Fish Welfare Policy or Creating a Shellfish Welfare Policy.

• Farm Visitation: Develop or review a policy for welcoming and managing visitors.  Sharing the 24/7 work that you do to nurture, grow and market healthy and wholesome farm-raised fish or shellfish is a valuable means to educate your community and public decision-makers. Contact the NAA for guidance entitled, Managing Public Visitation and Basic Steps to Prepare for Animal Rights Activism.

• Biosecurity Plan: Implement or review a farm biosecurity plan. A major component of a biosecurity plan is to restrict the movement of visitors to the farm or processing plant and to restrict employees to their assigned areas of responsibility. The biosecurity plan is typically focused on reducing risk of introducing disease or food safety hazards to the farm and farm products. However, clearly described and posted notices of visitor and employee access restrictions can assist in identifying visitor or employee intentions of conducting unauthorized actions. For assistance in developing a biosecurity plan, review the What You Need to Know About Biosecurity and How to Design Your Biosecurity Plan webinars on the NAA website at http://thenaa.net/webinars and talk to your veterinarian or aquatic animal health professional. Contact the NAA for guidance entitled, Basic Steps to Prepare for Animal Rights Group Activism.

• Re-examine farming practices: Make time to walk through the farm, possibly bringing in a trusted family member or friend who has not spent much time on farms, to re-examine and change practices that might appear harmful to someone unfamiliar with fish or shellfish farming.

• Review your farm or association web site to make sure there is nothing (text or images) that might be construed as being harmful to animals. Meet with employees or contractors responsible for your website and electronic communication to advise them of a potential cyber-attack by anti-farming groups. Ask them if your website and email communications are sufficiently protected.

• Meet with employees to explain the potential threat, review policies, and provide instructions on who to contact, how to report suspicious and inappropriate activities, and how to avoid an angry confrontation with activists focused upon creating negative images or comments. Discuss how the social media can be used negatively. Contact the NAA for guidance entitled, Creating an Employee Animal Care Agreement.

• Prepare for protests: Animal rights organizations protest at farms, businesses, wholesalers, retailers, meetings and conferences and will interfere with vehicular traffic that is transporting animals or animal products. Their goal is to trigger angry responses that do not reflect the moral or ethical standards of the farming community. At a minimum, prepare for protests by communicating with law enforcement in advance of incidents and understanding who to contact and how to request assistance if a protest occurs. Do not engage with activists and avoid being baited-in by inflammatory tactics. Contact the NAA for guidance entitled, Basic Steps to Prepare for Animal Rights Activists and Create a Partnership with Law Enforcement.

• Speaking to the media and public: Presenting your farm and your dedication to farming and animal husbandry is an important activity. How you and your farm are presented visually to the public may be more important in this age of instant images than what you say or write. Contact the NAA for guidance entitled, Media and Public Interaction.

• Learn your rights and protections under local, state or federal law. Contact the NAA for guidance entitled, Create a Partnership with Law Enforcement.

Please keep in mind this information is provided as a NAA member service for information purposes only. Seek individualized professional legal advice prior to implementing these practices to ensure compliance with legal standards and contact local law enforcement if you anticipate protests. Learn your rights and protections under local, state or federal law.