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Monday, February 22, 2010

Meatpackers, vets, some states not happy with proposed system for tracking livestock

At the beginning of the month we reported the Department of Agriculture had abandoned plans for a national animal identification system to track livestock from "birth to the butcher shop." Now some meat-industry officials and state governments are rallying against the new system, Scott Kilman of The Wall Street Journal reports. "Meatpackers worry that a narrower program proposed by Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack could exacerbate worries abroad about U.S. meat exports," Kilman writes. "State officials are concerned the federal government is creating a new regulatory burden for which states have scant resources."

Federal officials maintain the six-year-old voluntary animal ID program never "attracted enough participation from farmers and ranchers to be effective," Kilman reports, adding that they are "hoping to placate small farmers leery of federal oversight." The National Animal Identification System was launched after a U.S. mad cow disease scare in 2003, when animal-health experts said a national ID system was essential for rapidly containing livestock diseases.

The new program would require states to track livestock moving across state borders, but would exempt those "slaughtered in the states where they are raised, even if the meat will go into interstate commerce," Kilman reports. The switch "fails to meet the need of meatpackers and their customers to swiftly and accurately trace livestock to the farm of origin," Gary Mickelson, a spokesman for meat giant Tyson Foods Inc., told Kilman. Ron DeHaven, who was USDA's chief veterinarian during the mad-cow scare and is now executive vice president of the American Veterinary Medical Association, added, "We are disappointed by the decision. The ability to trace is only becoming more important to our trading partners." (Read more)

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