This is a federal lookup — it doesn’t find state-licensed plants.
A USDA/FSIS EST. number identifies a federally inspected plant. 30 states also run their own state meat and poultry inspection programs certified by USDA as “at least equal to” federal inspection — those plants carry a state inspection legend with a state establishment number that will not match in the tool below. If your package carries a state legend, use the FAT state processor lookup instead — the amber button below opens it. The FAT state-rules hub explains how the four inspection pathways work.
State processor lookup — search a state establishment number or plant name in any of the 30 states →
All 30 states that run a state meat and/or poultry inspection program:
State meat AND poultry programs (26 states): Alabama, Arizona, Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming.
State meat-only programs (4 states): Arkansas, Georgia, Oregon, South Dakota. In these states poultry inspection is entirely federal.
The other 20 states plus DC have no state meat or poultry inspection program — every commercial plant there is federally inspected and the USDA EST. number lookup below returns them. Authoritative list: FSIS — States With and Without Inspection Programs.
Two special cases: Under the federal Cooperative Interstate Shipment (CIS) program, a qualifying small state-inspected plant (generally ≤25 employees) can earn a federal-style mark and ship interstate — a CIS plant may therefore appear in both lookups. Under the Talmadge-Aiken (TA) program (active in Mississippi and several other states), state inspectors work inside federal plants; those plants carry a federal EST. number and appear in the tool below.
No EST. number on the label at all? Meat that a grocery store or butcher shop cuts, grinds, or repackages for its own customers falls under the federal retail exemption (21 U.S.C. 661(c)(2); 9 CFR 303.1(d)) — the store is not an inspected establishment, so its label carries no EST. number and the plant that actually fabricated the meat cannot be found in this lookup or any state lookup. FAT’s research paper The Retail Exemption traces how that processor identity is lost between the loading dock and the meat case.
Meat & Seafood Processor Lookup
Search by parent company, consumer brand, or USDA EST. number to trace the corporate ownership, processing facilities, and public enforcement record behind any major meat or seafood product. Parent company coverage is limited to large and mid-size processors with significant U.S. market presence; smaller regional and independent operators are not yet included. For meat and poultry products and catfish, the EST. number on the label identifies the USDA-inspected facility.
For most other seafood — tuna, salmon, shrimp, cod, shellfish — those products are regulated by the FDA, do not carry a USDA EST number, and therefore can only be searched here by parent company or brand name. This lookup covers who owns the major seafood brands and companies. For FDA enforcement actions against individual seafood processors and importers — warning letters, injunctions, and import alerts, including many smaller and foreign operators not covered here — see the separate FAT FDA Seafood Enforcement Lookup. The two pages answer different questions: this one covers corporate ownership and FSIS plant records for large and mid-size processors; the FDA seafood page covers the regulatory enforcement record for processors of all sizes — large, small, and foreign.
The full list of FSIS-inspected processing facilities operated by that company or its subsidiaries, with establishment number, city, state, and activity type for each plant — drawn live from the FAT database, which tracks over 12,000 federally inspected establishments updated monthly from USDA FSIS. Each facility links to FAT's individual inspection record, showing the plant's complete recall and enforcement history since 1994, every DBA name the facility has operated under, and species and processing activity data. The expanded card also shows the company's consumer brands, operating divisions, revenue, and links to FAT's sector enforcement maps and economic concentration research for beef, pork, poultry, and seafood.
What this lookup covers
▲ Ownership structure
Which parent company controls the facility or brand, which operating divisions they run, and the full corporate chain behind the product.
◆ Associated brands
Every consumer brand connected to a parent company or plant, so you can trace a label back through the corporate structure.
― Economic concentration
Market share data, antitrust enforcement actions (DOJ / FTC), and concentration metrics for the relevant protein sector. Linked to FAT research series.
⚑ FSIS enforcement
USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service enforcement actions, recalls, and compliance history for facilities and their parent companies.
◀ Environmental compliance
EPA and state-level water and air violations — discharge permits, Clean Water Act enforcement, Clean Air Act actions — associated with company facilities.
► Worker safety (OSHA)
OSHA workplace-safety enforcement at a facility — inspections, citations (serious, willful, repeat), penalties, and any fatality or severe-injury record. A separate axis from food safety. Shown when you search by USDA EST. number.