Sinergia March 21, 2025 Statement - Key Quote: "JBS clearly states in Brazilian Portuguese on its website: “100% da mossa abolida até 2027,” which translates to “100% of ear cropping will be abolished by 2027.” [...] Sinergia’s Brazilian team, which is native in Portuguese but not English, made a minor mistake in the spreadsheet shared with ACE. It stated “Committed to banning ear notching by 2023,”"
ACE's Spreadsheets for Sinergia, Recording from April 11 , 2025 - Cell K10 Quote: "The second comment previously read “Committed to banning ear notching by 2023" but was updated in March 2025. Because of this miscommunication, although it would have been ideal to apply discounts at both the “number of animals affected” and the “SADs averted per dollar” levels, our SADs estimates were already conservative, and the magnitude of the change would not affect our decision to recommend Sinergia. Therefore, we have not refreshed the calculations for the number of animals impacted by the commitment."
ACE's Spreadsheets for Sinergia, Recording from November 6, 2025 - Cell K10 Quote: "The second comment previously read “Committed to banning ear notching by 2023" but was updated in March 2025. Because of this miscommunication, although it would have been ideal to apply discounts at both the “number of animals affected” and the “SADs averted per dollar” levels, our SADs estimates were already conservative, and the magnitude of the change would not affect our decision to recommend Sinergia. Therefore, we have not refreshed the calculations for the number of animals impacted by the commitment."
On April 21, 2025, we posted that Sinergia is committing fraud (this was a legal opinion from an experienced attorney).
Less than 24 hours after the fraud post, Sinergia removed the 354 piglets per dollar metric from their main donation page, and replaced it with a new claim: 285 piglets per dollar.[2] However, this updated metric is still based on knowingly false information.
For example, the 285 figure relies on Sinergia being credited for securing a commitment from JBS to stop ear-notching pigs by 2023. But JBS never made that commitment—and both ACE and Sinergia have acknowledged this.[3] This issue alone leads to Sinergia being credited with helping over 10 million JBS piglets they did not help.[4]
We pointed this out months ago[5], and the EA community sided with ACE and Sinergia. At this point, even when metrics are acknowledged to be false, they remain in use[6] and are defended. There is little we can do about that.
Sinergia Comment - Key Quote: "JBS clearly states in Brazilian Portuguese on its website: “100% da mossa abolida até 2027,” which translates to “100% of ear cropping will be abolished by 2027.” [...] Sinergia’s Brazilian team, which is native in Portuguese but not English, made a minor mistake in the spreadsheet shared with ACE. It stated “Committed to banning ear notching by 2023,”"
ACE's Spreadsheets for Sinergia, Recording from November 6, 2025 - Cell K10 Quote: "The second comment previously read “Committed to banning ear notching by 2023" but was updated in March 2025. Because of this miscommunication, although it would have been ideal to apply discounts at both the “number of animals affected” and the “SADs averted per dollar” levels, our SADs estimates were already conservative, and the magnitude of the change would not affect our decision to recommend Sinergia. Therefore, we have not refreshed the calculations for the number of animals impacted by the commitment."
ACE/Sinergia only used 1 row for each company, regardless of how many commitments they made.
This resulted in the wrong deadlines being used for numerous commitments. For example, for Alibem in row 4, 2031 is used as the transition deadline and 2045 as the legal deadline for all of the commitments, even though the commitments have different transition & legal deadlines.
Overall, this results in Sinergia being credited for helping millions of additional pigs who were not helped.
Re: Litigation: It sounds like your read of "much of our current efforts involve policy advocacy andlitigation, which we keep confidential" was something akin to "we are actively engaged in one or more already-filed lawsuits," which is not how it was intended. What we meant was that litigation as a general strategy is one of our current efforts (as opposed to some other strategy, for example), and that confidentiality is important to us in that strategy. At this stage, this practically means things like researching issues and causes of action, searching for plaintiffs, consulting with potential witnesses, and other tasks performed in preparation for litigation. With that said, in the interest of disambiguation, we will edit the original post for clarity and note how it has been edited.
Thank you for fixing it.
Re: Confidentiality: As for why confidentiality is important, this is because opposition could take more effective countermeasures to lower the effectiveness of our interventions if they knew exactly what we were doing or preparing to do.
We’ve openly stated that in many circumstances, confidentiality is appropriate or even necessary. If you’re preparing for a lawsuit, we don’t object to keeping specific legal strategies or related information confidential. Our concern has never been about the existence of confidentiality—it’s about how confidentiality was used rhetorically to deflect criticism, and to suggest more progress and impact than the facts supported.
You asked us not to mention that SPI's work is confidential, claiming it “could raise suspicion from industry.” This reason doesn’t make sense. Simply knowing SPI has some form of confidential work does not provide any meaningful information; everyone does work that could be self-labeled as confidential. Industry does not care about a charity that filed zero lawsuits, litigated zero cases, and operated with $0 in expenditures in their most recent fiscal year.
Further, there is no way for any opposition to develop “more effective countermeasures” in reaction to simply knowing SPI has some form of work that’s been self-labeled as confidential.
Re: Pending cases: As others have noted in this thread, there are multiple reasonable interpretations of the phrase "pending cases." We thought it understandable from the context of the post, but again, to be as clear as possible, we will edit the original post and note how it has been edited.
When you say: "Much of our current efforts involve […] litigation, which we keep confidential for operational reasons - sharing details publicly would compromise pending cases."
there’s a good chance many people will reasonably interpret that to mean:
You’ve actually done litigation, and
You have legal cases that are currently pending.
Since neither of those things is true, the statement was materially misleading.
Invoking confidentiality here discouraged additional inquiry, and furthered the false impression that SPI was engaged in sensitive, ongoing litigation, despite no cases having been filed.
Re: Policy advocacy: The types of policy advocacy actions we engage in range from organizational outreach, public outreach, and legislator/regulator outreach. These are ongoing initiatives and not yet fully realized outcomes. We do not think that having the words "Reform Pesticide Use" on our website next to our other initiatives implies that we have already finished the initiative.
Above is an image from SPI's website.
“We try to reform pesticide use” and “We do reform pesticide use” are two completely different claims—just like saying “We try to discover aliens” versus “We do discover aliens.”
You can’t honestly claim to reform pesticide use until pesticide use is actually changing as a result of your work.
Yes, we think both of those wordings would have been acceptable. Ideally, though, the organization would also clarify what it's actually doing to try to reform pesticide use—whether that's creating content, conducting research, or something else.
SPI stated: "Much of our current efforts involve […] litigation, which we keep confidential for operational reasons - sharing details publicly would compromise pending cases."[1]
We do not think SPI's statement makes it clear that SPI has not litigated any cases, and only has "potential litigation in development and preparation."[2]
Their response disclosed that they were running on volunteer labor with a shoestring budget.
Filing cases is often free for volunteer-run charities due to fee waivers.
Moreover, the reference to a desire for confidentiality strongly implies that the referenced cases were at the pre-filing stage of the litigation process. Civil actions are almost always a matter of public record, and the case-initiating documents
There is often a lot of information that you'd still want to keep confidential even if the lawsuit you've filed can be found with a docket number. Some of this confidentiality is even legally required.
In practice, it is also much less likely that people would find your cases if you don't mention them to anyone (i.e. confidentiality).
False Claim: "SPI Uses 'Confidentiality' to Mislead the Public" SPI has never used confidentiality to mislead anyone.
SPI has done no litigation, yet SPI publicly stated: "Much of our current efforts involve policy advocacy and litigation, which we keep confidential."
This is using confidentiality to mislead the public.
It is also notable that you now say you merely have "potential litigation in development," which is materially different from litigation.
False Claim: "SPI Used 'Confidentiality' to Mislead Vetted Causes" SPI had genuine concerns about how confidentiality was discussed in VettedCauses' draft.
You asked us not to mention that SPI's work is confidential, claiming it “could raise suspicion from industry.” We accommodated your request. You then responded to our critique by raising confidentiality as a defense, without giving us the chance to update our review to note that you'd asked us to not mention confidentiality.
More importantly: Why would industry care about SPI's work? You’ve filed zero lawsuits, litigated zero cases, and operated with $0 in expenditures in your most recent fiscal year.
Mischaracterization of "Pending Cases": VettedCauses claims we "legally never had a 'pending case.'" Our use of "pending cases" refers to potential litigation in development and preparation - which is a common colloquial usage of the phrase.
This is not a common colloquial usage of the phrase, and it is patently false legally. SPI has no pending cases, and never has.
False Claim: "It is impossible to reform pesticide use with $0" This demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of advocacy work in general. Public advocacy, policy research, coalition building, and strategy development can all be done on a volunteer basis at zero cost. We have engaged in advocacy and continue to do so as volunteers.
When you claim to "Reform pesticide use," are you referring to things like posting on your Instagram?
How has pesticide use changed because of SPI?
False Claim: "SPI secures donations with inaccurate claims" We have been completely transparent with our donors about our stage of development, our accomplished tasks, our volunteer status, and our work. We have never made inaccurate claims to secure donations.
If this were true, it would've been known that SPI has filed zero lawsuits and litigated zero cases. Instead, SPI decided to claim that much of their work involves "litigation" and that they have "pending cases."
We hope that in future reviews, VettedCauses will engage in follow-up dialogue when they have concerns about an organization's statements.
We would have followed up, but based on your prior actions, we expected that even basic facts—like the fact that you’ve filed zero lawsuits and litigated zero cases—would be labeled “confidential,” and that we’d be accused of violating confidentiality if we included them.
Also, is there really no information you can share about SPI's work so far? This doesn't match my impression of the work they were up to.
We searched for publicly available information about SPI's work, and also reached out directly to SPI. We shared multiple drafts of the review with SPI and, between drafts, specifically asked for information about their work. However, SPI told us there wasn’t any work we could include in the review.
Shrimp Welfare Projects' impact page (which says they have helped3.3 billion shrimp per year;
The 3.3 billion shrimp per year estimate reflects the total projected impact if all planned stunners are deployed. As of April 2025, Shrimp Welfare Project has agreed to distribute 17 stunners, but less than 40% have actually been deployed so far (see Section "How it Works").
It typically takes 6 to 8 months to distribute a stunner and have it operational once an agreement has been signed (see Citation 6). The remaining stunners should be operational shortly.
In our view, it is unacceptable to:
ACE and Sinergia have done exactly that, and are continuing to do so as of this writing.[2]
[2]
Our values do not align with the values EA practices.
Sinergia March 21, 2025 Statement - Key Quote: "JBS clearly states in Brazilian Portuguese on its website: “100% da mossa abolida até 2027,” which translates to “100% of ear cropping will be abolished by 2027.” [...] Sinergia’s Brazilian team, which is native in Portuguese but not English, made a minor mistake in the spreadsheet shared with ACE. It stated “Committed to banning ear notching by 2023,”"
ACE's Spreadsheets for Sinergia, Recording from April 11 , 2025 - Cell K10 Quote: "The second comment previously read “Committed to banning ear notching by 2023" but was updated in March 2025. Because of this miscommunication, although it would have been ideal to apply discounts at both the “number of animals affected” and the “SADs averted per dollar” levels, our SADs estimates were already conservative, and the magnitude of the change would not affect our decision to recommend Sinergia. Therefore, we have not refreshed the calculations for the number of animals impacted by the commitment."
ACE's Spreadsheets for Sinergia, Recording from November 6, 2025 - Cell K10 Quote: "The second comment previously read “Committed to banning ear notching by 2023" but was updated in March 2025. Because of this miscommunication, although it would have been ideal to apply discounts at both the “number of animals affected” and the “SADs averted per dollar” levels, our SADs estimates were already conservative, and the magnitude of the change would not affect our decision to recommend Sinergia. Therefore, we have not refreshed the calculations for the number of animals impacted by the commitment."
Note that this is only one of the pieces of knowingly false information being used by ACE, and it results in Sinergia being credited for helping over 10 million JBS piglets that they did not help.
November 7, 2025 - Sinergia's Main Donation Page. It has now been over half a year, and Sinergia is still advertising the 285 piglets per dollar metric that is based on knowingly false information. Sinergia began advertising this metric on April 22, 2025.
We posted a critique of Sinergia's 354 piglets per dollar metric on February 21, 2025. Sinergia responded by admitting the metric was wrong[1], but wouldn't stop advertising it.
On April 21, 2025, we posted that Sinergia is committing fraud (this was a legal opinion from an experienced attorney).
Less than 24 hours after the fraud post, Sinergia removed the 354 piglets per dollar metric from their main donation page, and replaced it with a new claim: 285 piglets per dollar.[2] However, this updated metric is still based on knowingly false information.
For example, the 285 figure relies on Sinergia being credited for securing a commitment from JBS to stop ear-notching pigs by 2023. But JBS never made that commitment—and both ACE and Sinergia have acknowledged this.[3] This issue alone leads to Sinergia being credited with helping over 10 million JBS piglets they did not help.[4]
We pointed this out months ago[5], and the EA community sided with ACE and Sinergia. At this point, even when metrics are acknowledged to be false, they remain in use[6] and are defended. There is little we can do about that.
Sinergia's April 17, 2025 Response
Sinergia's March 21, 2025 Response
April 21, 2025 - Sinergia Donation Page
April 21, 2025 - Vetted Causes Posts that Sinergia is Committing Fraud
April 22, 2025 - Sinergia Donation Page
Sinergia Comment - Key Quote: "JBS clearly states in Brazilian Portuguese on its website: “100% da mossa abolida até 2027,” which translates to “100% of ear cropping will be abolished by 2027.” [...] Sinergia’s Brazilian team, which is native in Portuguese but not English, made a minor mistake in the spreadsheet shared with ACE. It stated “Committed to banning ear notching by 2023,”"
ACE's Spreadsheets for Sinergia, Recording from November 6, 2025 - Cell K10 Quote: "The second comment previously read “Committed to banning ear notching by 2023" but was updated in March 2025. Because of this miscommunication, although it would have been ideal to apply discounts at both the “number of animals affected” and the “SADs averted per dollar” levels, our SADs estimates were already conservative, and the magnitude of the change would not affect our decision to recommend Sinergia. Therefore, we have not refreshed the calculations for the number of animals impacted by the commitment."
ACE's Spreadsheets for Sinergia, Recording from November 6, 2025
Vetted Causes Post from March 22, 2025
Vetted Causes Post from April 17, 2025
November 6, 2025 - Sinergia's Main Donation Page. It has now been over half a year, and Sinergia is still using the 285 piglets per dollar metric that is based on knowingly false information.
ACE/Sinergia only used 1 row for each company, regardless of how many commitments they made.
This resulted in the wrong deadlines being used for numerous commitments. For example, for Alibem in row 4, 2031 is used as the transition deadline and 2045 as the legal deadline for all of the commitments, even though the commitments have different transition & legal deadlines.
Overall, this results in Sinergia being credited for helping millions of additional pigs who were not helped.
Thank you for fixing it.
We’ve openly stated that in many circumstances, confidentiality is appropriate or even necessary. If you’re preparing for a lawsuit, we don’t object to keeping specific legal strategies or related information confidential. Our concern has never been about the existence of confidentiality—it’s about how confidentiality was used rhetorically to deflect criticism, and to suggest more progress and impact than the facts supported.
You asked us not to mention that SPI's work is confidential, claiming it “could raise suspicion from industry.” This reason doesn’t make sense. Simply knowing SPI has some form of confidential work does not provide any meaningful information; everyone does work that could be self-labeled as confidential. Industry does not care about a charity that filed zero lawsuits, litigated zero cases, and operated with $0 in expenditures in their most recent fiscal year.
Further, there is no way for any opposition to develop “more effective countermeasures” in reaction to simply knowing SPI has some form of work that’s been self-labeled as confidential.
When you say: "Much of our current efforts involve […] litigation, which we keep confidential for operational reasons - sharing details publicly would compromise pending cases."
there’s a good chance many people will reasonably interpret that to mean:
Since neither of those things is true, the statement was materially misleading.
Invoking confidentiality here discouraged additional inquiry, and furthered the false impression that SPI was engaged in sensitive, ongoing litigation, despite no cases having been filed.
Above is an image from SPI's website.
“We try to reform pesticide use” and “We do reform pesticide use” are two completely different claims—just like saying “We try to discover aliens” versus “We do discover aliens.”
You can’t honestly claim to reform pesticide use until pesticide use is actually changing as a result of your work.
Thanks for the comment, Hugh.
Yes, we think both of those wordings would have been acceptable. Ideally, though, the organization would also clarify what it's actually doing to try to reform pesticide use—whether that's creating content, conducting research, or something else.
Thank you for your comment Michael. You've contested one factual assertion we made, so we will address that.
We'd appreciate if you could answer two questions:
Our answer to both questions is "no." How about you?
SPI stated: "Much of our current efforts involve […] litigation, which we keep confidential for operational reasons - sharing details publicly would compromise pending cases."[1]
We do not think SPI's statement makes it clear that SPI has not litigated any cases, and only has "potential litigation in development and preparation."[2]
Filing cases is often free for volunteer-run charities due to fee waivers.
There is often a lot of information that you'd still want to keep confidential even if the lawsuit you've filed can be found with a docket number. Some of this confidentiality is even legally required.
In practice, it is also much less likely that people would find your cases if you don't mention them to anyone (i.e. confidentiality).
https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/KuwEsBTGXSSxrkh6m/society-for-the-protection-of-insects-review?commentId=MicynucEovxbejNeL
https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/sk9btzq9MjivvYtXG/spi-the-litigators-that-have-never-litigated-a-case?commentId=TiyoBgmn4fGRaHH8S
SPI has done no litigation, yet SPI publicly stated: "Much of our current efforts involve policy advocacy and litigation, which we keep confidential."
This is using confidentiality to mislead the public.
It is also notable that you now say you merely have "potential litigation in development," which is materially different from litigation.
You asked us not to mention that SPI's work is confidential, claiming it “could raise suspicion from industry.” We accommodated your request. You then responded to our critique by raising confidentiality as a defense, without giving us the chance to update our review to note that you'd asked us to not mention confidentiality.
More importantly: Why would industry care about SPI's work? You’ve filed zero lawsuits, litigated zero cases, and operated with $0 in expenditures in your most recent fiscal year.
This is not a common colloquial usage of the phrase, and it is patently false legally. SPI has no pending cases, and never has.
When you claim to "Reform pesticide use," are you referring to things like posting on your Instagram?
How has pesticide use changed because of SPI?
If this were true, it would've been known that SPI has filed zero lawsuits and litigated zero cases. Instead, SPI decided to claim that much of their work involves "litigation" and that they have "pending cases."
We would have followed up, but based on your prior actions, we expected that even basic facts—like the fact that you’ve filed zero lawsuits and litigated zero cases—would be labeled “confidential,” and that we’d be accused of violating confidentiality if we included them.
Hi Eevee, thanks for the comment.
We searched for publicly available information about SPI's work, and also reached out directly to SPI. We shared multiple drafts of the review with SPI and, between drafts, specifically asked for information about their work. However, SPI told us there wasn’t any work we could include in the review.
The 3.3 billion shrimp per year estimate reflects the total projected impact if all planned stunners are deployed. As of April 2025, Shrimp Welfare Project has agreed to distribute 17 stunners, but less than 40% have actually been deployed so far (see Section "How it Works").
It typically takes 6 to 8 months to distribute a stunner and have it operational once an agreement has been signed (see Citation 6). The remaining stunners should be operational shortly.