Feedlot Issues Management Briefs

Summary

As part of a routine review of its issues management capacity, MLA and ALFA have jointly identified a need to develop a series of pre-approved feedlot issues briefs for use by industry personnel as a reference in the management of incidents, including the communication of key facts and messages.

A list of potential issues have been developed by ALFA and MLA. Review of scientific literature, industry integrity systems, federal and state regulations occurred to build evidenced-based responses these incidents. These included managing issues associated with animal welfare, animal health, environment, industry structure, product integrity and market failure. 

The project methodology involved the following process:

• The key issues that require communication preparedness were identified by ALFA and MLA,
• Each Issues Management Brief aimed to address each specific issue by defining the issue, explaining industry's position (and/or policy) or progress on the issue, key messages for the intended audiences, background technical information (including applicable scientific references and links to articles), and any relevant government policy,
• An Issues Management Framework for the timely retrieval of issues briefs and associated material, was created 
• The issues management framework has been available to ALFA and MLA to assist Peak Industry Councils in responding to issues management.