Charlie Arnot

Charlie Arnot is a partner in CMA Consulting, a Kansas City, Missouri based public relations firm. A media release from the Animal Agriculture Alliance, an industry lobby group, described Arnot as "President of CMA Consulting and long-time swine industry insider." 

Arnot is involved in the food industry's PR campaign against author Eric Schlosser and his books "Fast Food Nation" and "Chew On This". "Who's After Schlosser" is an article in the  in 5/15/06 Advertising Age. reporting that "The site Best Food Nation was registered on May 3 to Charlie Arnot, president   of CMA Consulting, Kansas City, Mo., an issues management, public  relations and communications firm.

According to his biography on a University of Minnesota website, Charlie Arnot of CMA Consulting's "career in public relations, communications and journalism has been quite diverse. In 2004 he  started his own consulting firm in Kansas City, Missouri. In addition  to consulting with leading companies and associations on  communications and public affairs, he co-authors the "Hog Industry Insider" weekly column for Feedstuffs, the nations leading agri- business newspaper." 

"For the ten previous years he was vice president of communications and public affairs for Premium Standard Farms,  responsible for all internal and external communication, government  relations and issue management. Prior to joining Premium Standard  Farms he worked for a public relations agency, was an award winning  radio journalist and worked in video and film. Charlie grew up in  southeast Nebraska and graduated from the University of Nebraska with  a Bachelor of Journalism degree," his biographical note states. 

Arnot spoke at the 2006 Animal Agriculture Alliance conference. At the conference Arnot outlined what he dubbed as his "anticipatory issues management" (AIM) model for pre-empting potential crises. "AIM is a process to align a company's or industry's performance with stakeholder expectations. It is a great way to save resources and reduce risk by avoiding crises in the first place. What it is not is a public relations tool," he claimed. 

Other SourceWatch resources

 * Animal Agriculture Alliance
 * Best Food Nation
 * Center for Food Integrity
 * Crisis management
 * Issues management
 * The Food Industry Campaign to Undermine 'Chew On This'

Background information

 * "Keynote Addresses", Allan D. Leman Swine Conference, University of Minnesota: Veterinary Continuing Education, September 25, 2006.

Presentations by Arnot

 * Animal Agriculture Alliance, "Groundbreaking Model for Aligning Expectations Introduced Focused on Proactively Addressing Issues", Media Release, March 23, 2006.
 * Lost in Translation – why consumers don’t understand our position on animal welfare, Allan D. Leman Swine Conference, University of Minnesota: Vetinary Continuing Education, September 25, 2006. (Forthcoming)