In 2016, the fishmeal plant in Abbeville, Louisiana owned by Omega Protein pleaded guilty to violating the Clean Water Act, by illegally dumping wastewater into a canal near the facility.1 The company agreed to pay a $1 million fine and an additional community service payment of $200,000.
On September 8, 2022, a crew member on a vessel owned by Omega Protein's fishing partner Ocean Harvesters, fishing off the coast of Louisiana, cut loose a net full of about 900,000 menhaden, because the catch was too large to bring on board.2 The dead fish caused a rotting mass, drawing complaints from charter boat captains also hoping to fish in the area. “It’s hard not to be disgusted when you see that,” Chris Macaluso, marine fisheries director for the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, told Nola News. “It seems excessively wasteful to catch that much fish, and it’s just left there. There should be some sort of penalty.”
On September 22, 2023, the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries reported that vessels fishing for Daybrook and Omega Protein were responsible for three menhaden spills between September 11th and 14th. The spills led to approximately “850,000 menhaden washing up on the Southwest Coast of the US state near Cameron Parish.”3 In October 2023, in response to the spills, the Louisiana Wildlife and Fisheries Commission proposed a new expanded buffer zone to prevent commercial fishing too close to the coastline, according to local press. The proposal also called for “more stringent penalties and reporting requirements.”4
On October 17, 2023, a 35-year-old worker who was cleaning the Omega Protein’s fishmeal plant in Abbeville, Louisiana fell into a pile of fishmeal and died from asphyxiation.5 Federal labor inspectors investigated the incident and fined Omega Protein $16,000.6
Between 2020 and 2025, Omega Protein’s Abbeville plant was the subject of one “informal enforcement action” for environmental violations including of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act.7 This plant was certified under the MarinTrust Global Standard for Responsible Supply between 2021 and 2027.8 This program requires plants holding this certification to comply with national environmental legislation, a standard that seems to have been violated according to research by The Outlaw Ocean Project.9
When asked for comment about issues relating to this plant, the spokesperson for Omega Protein, Bob Vanasse, said: “there are numerous publicly available statements and press releases that address the issues.”10