Maple Leaf exec is no stranger to crisis
McCain outlines strict safety protocols and the future of the meat-packing company
Thirteen years after a listeria outbreak at a Maple Leaf Foods plant that killed 22 people across Canada, meat-packing giant Maple Leaf Foods is once again confronting crisis — and change.
The number of Canadian meatpacking workers who’ve contracted COVID-19 over the course of the pandemic is easily in the hundreds. According to data compiled by independent journalist Nora Loreto, there have been at least 23 COVID-19 deaths to date linked to meatpacking or dairy facilities, including one at a Maple Leaf Foods plant in Quebec. Moreover, consumers are becoming increasingly aware of the environmental damage done by large-scale meat production.
Michael McCain, CEO of Maple Leaf Foods, is used to crisis. He was at the helm of the Mississauga-based company during the listeria outbreak in 2008 and oversaw drastic safety changes.
Now, he’s leading it through COVID-19. We spoke to McCain about the changing meat business, environmental sustainability, and why he wouldn’t go meatless:
Meat packing plants have seen a lot of infections over the course of the pandemic. Dozens of your workers
have fallen sick in Manitoba, Ontario and Quebec. At least one has died. What happened?
First of all, we’re very proud of the protocols that we put in place to keep our people safe. The facts throughout
the pandemic would indicate that they were remarkably effective in doing that. To the very best of our knowledge, working collaboratively with public health and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, we did not have any — and I underline, any — cases of workplace transmission. Many of our teammates became ill with COVID-19 because of community transmission.
I think one of the reasons we had such a good outcome in our supply chain was because we were early adopters. We were one of the first organizations in North America to build safety protocols and go into hard lockdown in our organization. Having said that, the most aggressive protocols in the world don’t have efficacy without constant and rigorous oversight to make sure those protocols are adhered to at all times. We built incredibly robust auditing and surveillance systems throughout our supply chain to make sure the protocols that we put in place were steadfastly adhered to.
If this wasn’t a case of workplace transmission, but rather, community transmission, why do you think meat packing plants tended to have high case counts?
The reality is that in food production — and particularly in meat operations — you have large populations that have the propensity to work in close proximity. We found the most important need for surveillance was actually in the lunchrooms where people are a little more relaxed, not on the floor of the facility.
Many people today would go into a modern meat processing facility today and liken it to a surgical room. We’ve already used incredibly protective gear, hand washing, facial coverings — they were already a part of our normative behaviour and protocols in the plants. The majority of the additional protocols that we had to put in place was separation. Every single individual had a numbered lunch station — and they could only eat in the numbered spot. If they were seen speaking to their neighbour, there was disciplinary action taken.
We spent over $50 million last year implementing these protocols. Over $50 million. They included temperature checks, screening — we screened every individual employee. We had separation from the minute they walked in the door. We remapped all of our locker rooms, cafeterias, and so forth. We hired a small army of people who basically act as surveillance to make sure the protocols were adhered to. The best protocols in the world, if they’re not adhered to, are meaningless.
What’s that meant for your bottom line these days? $50 million is not a small chunk of change.
At the end of the day, we absorbed that cost in 2020. Some portions of that are going to be perennial going forward. We had a pretty solid year. Some of our businesses did very well. Some, not as well. Our food service business was down dramatically. Our retail business offset that — it was quite robust. Our poultry business was not very strong. Our pork business was strong, mostly in Asia. We had lots of puts and takes in the business, but in total, they all came up to be roughly in line with our expectations.
You recently announced that Maple Leaf Foods workers would need to be vaccinated. What happens if workers don’t want the vaccine? Someone in your administrative staff might be able to work from home — but what about your plant staff ?
We have not mandated vaccination for our plants for that very reason. The conclusion we reached is that we want to protect our workers’ health, but we have to protect their jobs as well. In the case of an office worker, their job is not at risk because they can work from home. You can’t work from home when you work in a plant. So, in lieu of that, we’ve maintained our protocols in spite of the fact that over 85 per cent of our staff are now vaccinated.
But the Delta variant is a lot more infectious than the original COVID strain was. Are your protocols enough?
We still have had no cases of workplace transmission. In fact, we were going on very long periods where we’ve had zero cases. I feel very confident in the protocols that we’ve put in place in our plants to protect the health of our people.
Maple Leaf Foods has been fairly heavily involved in the meat-alternatives business for a while. You acquired Lightlife and Field Roast, two major meat-alternatives companies, several years ago. Do you have any other acquisitions in the works?
Plant-based businesses are an important part of our future. We still believe deeply in the future of the meat protein business, although we believe it has to be a different future for sustainability reasons.
Having said that, in our plantbased business, we are confident that there’s a significant growth opportunity. Right now, most of our activity is around organic growth. We’re investing in new plant capacity, new innovation. But we’re also committed to the future — and likely a different future — in meat protein.
What does that future look like? Some people may want the meat industry to move completely away from it, but it sounds like that’s not what you’re advocating at all.
The human body has been consuming meat protein for over 150,000 years, so it likely will for the next 150,000 years as well. That doesn’t mean the meat industry doesn’t need to change. It does. The metaphor that we’ve commonly used is around transportation. Transportation has a significant footprint, but we’re not asking for people to walk to work. The better answer is to fix the business — to fix the ills of the industry as opposed to trying to threaten its existence. There are significant technologies ahead of us that have the opportunity to materially change the footprint of animal meat production.
Like what?
The first is a technology described as anaerobic digestion. The No. 1 greenhouse gas emission in our total footprint in meat production happens to be from manure. It’s not transportation. It’s not what occurs in the facilities or factors or distribution system. It’s actually methane, which has a 25-to-1 ratio of impact relative to carbon. Technologies using anaerobic digestion can capture that methane and convert it to a renewable energy source. We’re working with a number of different organizations around the world to refine it, but the future of anaerobic digestion will completely change the footprint of emissions connected to manure in hog production and poultry production. Honestly, it’s super energizing.
The second one is around regenerative agriculture. I don’t know how much you are aware of it — it’s the single most exciting path forward in the entire spectrum of climate solutions, in my view, because it has the capacity to pivot an industry from one of the largest contributors to the problem into one of the most significant solutions to the problem. It’s an agricultural technique that has been abandoned over the last 100 years and the science shows that it has the capacity to sequester carbon in a way that no other path forward has. We’re really confident that the footprint attached to not just meat production, but all food and agribusiness can be materially altered in the future.
Would you ever go meatless? Definitely not. Definitely not. You mean 100 per cent meatless?
Yeah.
No. I like to think I have an incredibly balanced diet, which is a combination of meat protein and plant protein. It’s the right combination of starches and fruits and vegetables. I have a chocolate fix, but I don’t eat a lot of chocolate because that’s a part of my balanced diet. And I exercise rigorously every day. I think the model here is about balance.
What’s it been like running Maple Leaf Foods from home?
I think people can manage virtually doing managerial things. You can talk to people, you can download information, you can make decisions, you can analyze data. What you can’t do, virtually, is all of the things you would classify as leadership behaviours. As leaders, we connect with our people to give and receive energy. That sounds trite, but when I meet with our people, I get energized by that. When I meet with our people, I like to think that I energize them, to some degree.
Things like creativity are not served well in a virtual setting. Things like deep conversation are not served well in a virtual setting.
So, what’s it like managerially? It’s fine. It’s very effective. From a leadership perspective, where the physical connection with your teammates is really important — it’s not nearly as effective. We’re adopting a hybrid model going forward and we think that will yield the best combination of the leadership behaviours that require physical connection but offer flexibility in managerial behaviours.
Are there any similarities between what Maple Leaf Foods went through with the listeria outbreak in 2008 and what you’re going through now with COVID?
Possibly. Yes. What carried us through 2008 was our deep commitment to the leadership values that are so important to our organization. Acting with integrity. Doing what’s right, followed by a sense of transparency, accountability, and action orientation. They were clearly our guideposts in 2008. I’d like to think they were very similar guideposts through the pandemic. We set goals early in the pandemic and quickly implemented them around protecting the health and safety of our people first and ensuring the continuity of our supply chain second. I think the leadership values served us well through that as they did in 2008.