Plainville Farms fully supports the prosecution of any individuals shown in a People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) video depicting turkeys being mistreated, the company said in a statement on their website.
In August 2021, PETA released a video that showed turkeys being mistreated in a variety of ways. PETA claims that those turkeys were being raised for the Plainville brand. Following the video, Global Animal Partnership (GAP) suspended Plainville Farms from its programs and Whole Foods Market temporarily halted the sales of Plainville products.
“We are fully cooperating with law enforcement in order to investigate the PETA allegations, and fully support the prosecution of any individuals found to be involved in the mistreatment of any of our turkeys,” the website statement said.
“Regardless of the outcome of that investigation, none of the individuals addressed in the PETA allegations work for Plainville Farms any longer as of this writing.”
In addition to terminating 13 workers, the company has purchased body cameras to monitor all live operations team members. The surveillance footage will be routinely monitored internally and by outside third-party animal welfare experts.
Third-party experts will also conduct regular, unannounced audits of Plainville operations and the company plans to implement additional coaching and training measures for current and new employees.
“As you may be aware, PETA recently made allegations about the treatment of turkeys in our supply chain. We immediately pledged to you that we would thoroughly investigate these allegations and that we would use this moment to make meaningful, industry-leading enhancements in how we ensure that our gold standards of care are always employed,” the statement added.
Previously part of Hain Celestial’s Hain Pure Protein segment, Plainville Farms was acquired in 2019 by a newly-formed investor group known as Plainville Brands LLC.
Hain Celestial later sold the remainder of its poultry operations, FreeBird and Empire Kosher, to exit the industry.
Plainville Farms slaughtered 141 million pounds of live turkeys in 2020, but the company projected that production would increase to 146 million pounds in 2021.