Posts Tagged NAIS – About Control

Who speaks for family farmers?

Who speaks for family farmers?

By: Rhonda Perry, Minuteman Media, Worthington Daily Globe

ARMSTRONG, Mo. — My family has farmed in Missouri for over a century and I currently raise livestock and grain on 800 acres in Howard County, Mo. But folks like me always seem to get drowned out in Washington, D.C, by commodity groups purporting to represent my interests. The American Farm Bureau bills itself as the “voice of agriculture.” A seemingly innocent-sounding group called the National Milk Producers Federation (NMPF) calls itself “the only nationwide expression of dairy farmers.” These organizations spend millions in lobbying and donating money to politicians. In the halls of Congress, in the federal agencies, and in presidential administrations, representatives from these groups exert undue control over the agenda for food and agriculture policy.

It is nearly impossible to convince D.C. politicians that these corporate interests do not represent the interests of family farmers. Until now. The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) recently concluded 13 listening sessions to hear farmers’ input on the despised National Animal Identification System (NAIS) that calls for us to electronically tag and track the movements of every one of our animals. Factory farms, however, are allowed one group lot ID for their thousands of animals. Over $130 million of taxpayer money has been wasted on this radical, corporate-driven bureaucracy that originated from the National Institute for Animal Agriculture, a group comprised of — surprise, surprise — the Farm Bureau, National Pork Producers Council (NPPC), NMPF and agribusinesses such as Cargill. Only a gigantic outcry from farmers has stopped NAIS from becoming mandatory by its proposed 2009 date.

At listening sessions across the country, including one in Missouri attended by over 300 people, up to 95 percent of producers were united in their adamant disapproval of NAIS and how it would do nothing to address animal disease or food safety. The few folks in the crowd willing to go on record for their support of NAIS were uniformly from the likes of NPPC, Farm Bureau and NMPF allies. That should tell the media, Congress, USDA and the Obama administration to quit listening to these interest groups and quit thinking of them as representing family farmers!

Why do we have such a broken food system that allows for deadly E. coli in our meat and now peanut butter? Why have factory farms been allowed to proliferate like viruses in rural America? Because these interest groups have been allowed to use their false facade representing America’s “farmers” to con politicians into buying their disastrous policies, while simultaneously conning the media into thinking that they speak on behalf of those farmers. Now they have conned USDA, President Obama and members of Congress into thinking we need a mandatory NAIS program.

These same corporate farm groups have opposed more testing for mad cow disease, opposed increased inspection of meat processing plants where most food borne illnesses start and continue to thwart any efforts to address antibiotic abuses on factory farms. Meanwhile they advocate for free trade agreements that bring in foreign animals from countries with known disease outbreaks like foot-and-mouth and BSE. Thus, the folks most responsible for breeding animal disease are now trying to shift responsibility from corporate meatpackers and factory farms onto the backs of America’s independent family farmers through NAIS.

Since 2006, NPPC has donated over $350,000 to federal politicians and spent over $3 million in lobbying. NMPF has spent $2.2 million in lobbying, including for a mandatory NAIS, even while dairy farmers suffer their worst crisis since the Great Depression.

We are thankful that USDA took the time to listen to the voices of family farmers instead of relying on the same old corporate interest groups. Given the shocking chasm between our corporate farm groups and real family farmers, NAIS is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to bad farm policy that emanates from of Washington. So the next time you hear that “farm groups” oppose cracking down on antibiotics, or that they want to water down environmental regulations over factory farms or that we need another free trade agreement the likes of the one with Colombia, just remember whose interests these folks really represent–and it’s not rural America.

Rhonda Perry is a livestock and grain farmer from Howard County, Mo. She serves as Program Director of the Missouri Rural Crisis Center, a member of the National Family Farm Coalition.

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NAIS ~~ details from the Rancher’s side.

Note: Platt Land and Cattle is a large, family owned/operated cow-calf ranch with
owned and leased ranches in Arizona and New Mexico.
We oppose NAIS in total ~~~ by Jay Platt.


NAIS is simply an unworkable and highly intrusive bureaucratic boondoggle; it is a regulatory proposal for which a need has never been demonstrated and, more importantly, for which USDA has never provided specific citations of statutory and constitutional authority authorizing such action. NAIS should therefore be terminated in total.

More specific comments are as follows:

New Mexico Ranch1. No need for NAIS has ever been demonstrated.

USDA has failed to demonstrate a need for “48-hour trace back.” It has similarly failed to identify what diseases require the imposition on producers of such a costly, onerous, and intrusive program.

Producers, by their failure to register premises and their overwhelming opposition at the listening sessions, have sent a clear message: there is no need for NAIS. These producers have trillions of dollars at stake in livestock, land, equipment and water rights. Their very lives are bound up in that investment. Many have fine educations with degrees in veterinary science, law, and business.

We are left, however, with the preposterous proposition that government, academia, a few veterinarians, and tag/tech manufacturers with no corresponding stake in livestock, land, equipment and water rights know what is best for producers’ livestock herds.

The concept of “48-hour trace back” is from OIE’s Terrestrial Animal Health Code, Article 4.2.2, Performance Criteria, which suggests, as a measure of effect animal ID, that “all animals can be traced to the establishment of birth within 48 hours of an enquiry.” http://www.oie.int/eng/normes/mcode/en_chapitre_1.4.2.htm

USDA’s use of the word “premises” also comes from the OIE code. The glossary defines “establishment” as used in connection with 48-hour traceback as “the premises in which animals are kept.” http://www.oie.int/eng/normes/mcode/en_glossaire.htm#sous-chapitre-2

The purpose of the OIE Code is one of assuring “the sanitary safety of international trade in terrestrial animals and their products, (emphasis added) http://www.oie.int/eng/normes/en_mcode.htm?e1d10 and in his May 6, 2009, editorial, OIE’s Director General Bernard Vallat proudly proclaims, “One World, One Health. http://www.oie.int/eng/edito/en_lastedito.htm

During the gathering of the American Association of Bovine Practitioners in Vancouver in September, 2007, former USDA Under Secretary for Marketing and Regulatory Programs, Bruce Knight, was queried as to why USDA was making such a push for premises registration. His response: “It is quite simple. We want to be in compliance with OIE regulations by 2010.” http://www.r-calfusa.com/news_releases/2009/090507-nais.htm

In short, USDA has been less than transparent and honest with American cattle producers. It has been pushing an animal ID system to benefit industrialized agriculture–those involved in international trade. There can be absolutely no doubt on this point.

On June 11, 2009, Rosa DeLauro, Chairwoman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Agriculture issued a press release on the committee’s fiscal year 2010 bill which included the following statement :

The bill eliminates funding for the National Animal Identification System (NAIS). After receiving $142 million in funding since fiscal year 2004, APHIS has yet to put into operation an effective system that would provide needed animal health and livestock market benefits. USDA is currently conducting a public listening tour

around the country for several months to hear from stakeholders. Until USDA finishes its listening sessions and provides details as to how it will implement an effective ID system, continued investments into the current NAIS are unwarranted. (Emphasis added.)

At the NAIS listening sessions a welcoming video is shown featuring Secretary Vilsack. He asserts that “we will all agree that we need to protect the livestock markets and the livelihood of producers” and then continues:

I don’t want us to get to the point where Congress says they will not

continue to fund the system. If that were to happen, I would doubt the reliability of our market and that’s not where we want to be.

(Emphasis added.)

Apart from the fact that his nation is a net importer of beef, what markets are demanding NAIS? If indeed there is such a demand, cannot exporters work privately with producers on an export/ID program? USDA never answers such questions. The fact is that “markets” are not concerned about NAIS. They are concerned about exports which contain Canadian product.

The Korean meat export protocols list as ineligible,

  1. Beef and beef products derived from cattle imported from Canada for immediate slaughter .
  2. Beef and beef products derived from cattle imported from Canada that were resident in the U.S. less than 100 days prior to slaughter .

http://www.fsis.usda.gov/Regulations_&_Policies/Republic_of_Korea_Requirements/index.asp

In a June 10, 2003, letter from Toshikazu Ijichi, Japan’s Animal Health Division Director, Dr. Peter Fernandez, Deputy Administrator, Veterinary Services for USDA-APHIS was advised that Japan had “deleted Canada from the list of countries which are eligible to export” beef to Japan “in light of confirmation of a single case of BSE in Canada.”

Dr. Fernandez was further advised that

In order to protect Japan from possible introduction of BSE, I would like to ask you again not to export beef and its product which is derived from the [sic] cattle born, raised or slaughtered in the countries with indigenous BSE cases to Japan through your country. Therefore, I would like to ask you again to indicate the country of origin where the cattle from which the exported meat product to Japan was produced were born, raised and slaughtered . (Emphasis added.)

http://www.r-calfusa.com/Animal_Health/080618Exhibit1-LetterToNewYorkTimes-JapanAnimalHealthLetter.pdf

The notion that export markets are clamoring for the imposition of NAIS is simply not supported by the factual record. Of ironic interest in light of the above letter is USDA’s delay in the implementation–and its frustration of the clear intent–of COOL.

One thing is very clear from the listening sessions: producers, the owners of the animals USDA would ostensibly protect, overwhelmingly reject NAIS and the claimed need therefore. There is a great irony of paternalism–government knows best–vis-Ã -vis the producer rejection of NAIS in the “listening sessions” and their failure to register their “premises.”

USDA never mentions OIE, its Terrestrial Animal Health Code, and the Codex Alimentarius except by implication when it asserts that NAIS is needed to protect “markets,” a euphemism for trade. It has simply been disingenuous at best, as it panders to industrialized agriculture and ignores its statutory obligation to rural agriculture.

Such pandering has come at great cost to rural producers. Examining USDA data for the period from 1984 through 2006, farm/ranch share of income distribution from trade declined by 28% while services’ share doubled and trade/transportation’s share increased nearly 52%!

Using the period 1982 1984 as the base, and adjusting for inflation, the price of slaughter steers/heifers has declined 57% since 1947 while the retail beef price index has increased 3%! Today, the United States is a net importer of beef, some 17% of domestic supply is of foreign origin. USDA has failed those it was established to serve.

Qui bono? NAIS burdens producers with costs and intrusive regulations to benefit industrial agriculture and global trade. There are no benefits for producers in NAIS. Being in the business of accumulating and wielding power, Government is a beneficiary; the tag and technology companies will earn increased profits; meat packers will mine data and industrial agriculture engaged in international trade will likewise enjoy increased profits.

This is a simple issue of “follow the money.” USDA’s 2005 Strategic Plan for NAIS states that

In 2002, the National Institute of Animal Agriculture

(NIAA) initiated meetings that led to the development of the U.S.

Animal Identification Plan (USAIP). That work provided the

foundation data standards for the National Animal Identification

System (NAIS). (Emphasis added.) http://wlsb.state.wy.us/brands/Premises/brochure/NAIS_Draft_Strategic_Plan_42505.pdf

An examination of NIAA’s membership list discloses a lengthy list of tag/tech companies including AgInfoLink, Allflex, Brock’s Cattle-Identi Company, Cattle-Traq, Destron Fearing, EZ-ID/AVID ID systems, Farnam, Fort Supply technologies, Meta Farms, Inc., Micro Beef Technologies, and National Band and Tag, to name a few. The meat packing industry is represented by Cargill and AMI. http://animalagriculture.org/aboutNIAA/members/memberdirectory.asp

The head of NIAA’s Animal ID committee is from Allflex. http://animalagriculture.org/aboutNIAA/committees/AIDIS/animalid.asp

NCBA also appears as a member; however, it entered into a cooperative agreement with APHIS, taking money to promote premises registration.

http://www.cattlementocattlemen.org/watcPremisesRegistration.aspx

http://www-mirror.aphis.usda.gov/newsroom/speeches/content/2007/02/NatlCattlemen2-1-07.shtml

The producer bears all the costs and derives none of the benefits. That, simply, is the reason for the overwhelming rejection of NAIS by producers. The listening sessions, if USDA will listen, make that point beyond cavil.

The existing combination of hot brands, brand inspection, health papers, auction back tags, and border interdiction of disease has served this nation well for 100 years. Brucellosis, TB and other livestock diseases have been effectively controlled while FMD has been unknown in the country since 1929.

On its website, USDA/APHIS acknowledges that existing “programs have achieved significant success over the years in reducing animal disease” but then asserts that “animal disease remains a reality in the U.S. as illustrated in the following examples.” The two bovine diseases used to illustrate USDA’s assertion are BSE and TB. http://animalid.aphis.usda.gov/nais/why/animal_disease.shtml

This is overreaching at its best. BSE has an extended incubation period. BSE is spread not animal to animal but rather by the use of contaminated feed. The United States has not had a domestic case of BSE: the two reported U.S. cases were both atypical which is characterized by an absence of the spongiform changes in the brain caused by typical BSE. (Fact Sheet: Atypical BSE, published by NCBA and the Beef Checkoff.)

USDA, through extended litigation with R-CALF USA, fought to open the U.S. border to Canadian cattle including those over 30-months of age. Canada does have a BSE problem. USDA further litigated with Creekstone Farms to prevent that business from voluntarily testing its cattle for BSE.

Canada’s Food Inspection Agency has acknowledged that feed cohorts from known BSE animals were exported to this country for slaughter. For example, the CFIA announced that five cohorts of the November, 2008, BSE Holstein dairy cow were “exported for slaughter.” According to CFIA, “investigation showed” the feed cohorts “consumed the same potentially contaminated feed.” http://www.inspection.gc.ca/english/anima/heasan/disemala/bseesb/bccb2008/15investe.shtml

Given USDA’s i) laissez-faire attitude toward the importation of BSE from Canada, ii) its asserted position that its risk assessments and the removal of SRMs result in a de minimis risk to consumers, and iii) its insistence that U.S. producers cannot voluntarily test for BSE, the contention that BSE is a disease that must now be managed with NAIS is simply disingenuous.

BSE cannot be managed or prevented by NAIS following its importation. BSE should never be imported period. Dr. Stanley Prusiner, Nobel Prize winner for his work in the discovery of prions, the cause of BSE states:

Regardless of whether the tonsils and distal ileum have been removed from cattle and in the case of cattle 30 months of age and older, the brain, eyes, spinal cord, and trigeminal ganglia as well these measures are unlikely to be sufficient to ensure the safety of the meat we consume. The only reliable way to minimize the risk of humans developing vCJD from BSE-infected cattle is to eliminate BSE-infected cattle from the food chain. (Emphasis added.)

http://www.r-calfusa.com/BSE/081117-Exhibit%207,%20Prusiner%20Declaration.pdf

NAIS will do nothing to eliminate BSE from the food chain. USDA continues to allow the importation cattle from Canada which undeniably has a BSE problem. Dr. Prusiner further states that “active testing in the EU has shown that BSE-infected cattle may display no signs even though they harbor substantial numbers of prions that can be identified using a rapid test for BSE.” Id.

There is no rapid testing done in the United States and, as previously mentioned, USDA employed litigation to prevent Creekstone farms from voluntarily testing cattle. To assert that NAIS is now needed to manage BSE is an absurdity at best: either USDA with its risk assessments coupled with the removal of SRMs is correct and there is no BSE risk; or, Dr. Prusiner is correct and BSE should never be introduced into the food chain via imported cattle. In either case, NAIS is of no value.

With regard to TB , Audit Report, Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service’s Control Over the Bovine Tuberculosis Program, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Report No. 50601-0009-Ch, September, 2006. Section 2, page 19, states:

Between FYs 2001 and 2005, 75 percent (205 of 272) of the TB cases detected through slaughter surveillance were determined by APHIS to have originated from Mexico. In response, APHIS has worked with Mexico to improve their TB eradication program; however, these efforts are undermined by the disease’s 3 to 12 month incubation period. Cattle may test negative for the disease prior to export, but develop TB and infect U.S. cattle after import. Although the majority of TB-infected cattle

found by slaughter surveillance in the United States are from Mexico, APHIS has not developed controls to restrict the movement of cattle, or require additional testing to compensate for the disease’s incubation period. Until additional controls are added, APHIS cannot reasonably expect to achieve its goal and

eradicate TB when it is being imported into the United States each year. (Emphasis added.)

Page 19 of the Report further noted that Mexico annually “exports 1 million cattle to the United States”; that Mexico has “a higher prevalence of the disease” such that Mexican cattle “are more likely to be infected with TB”; that Mexico has “no accredited-free states” and in 2004 “reported over 2,000 TB-infected herds compared to just 10 positive herds reported by the United States”; and that “99 percent of the cattle imported from Mexico spend time on U.S. premises prior to slaughter” with such time generally ranging from “5 to 14 months.” (Emphasis added.)

Page 20 of the Report states that “despite the higher prevalence of TB-infected cattle in Mexico, APHIS has not established additional import controls or requirements to test or restrict the movement of Mexican cattle after importation to the United States” and that the cattle so imported “simply become part of the U.S. herds.” The lack of controls over Mexican cattle “has resulted in infected cattle being detected in 12 states over the last 5 years.” A chart on page 20 of the Report shows the states and numbers of TB cases traced to Mexico for FYs 2001-2005. That chart shows 2 in New Mexico and 5 in Arizona.

Page 22 of the Report set forth the conclusion that “APHIS was under utilizing high risk herds” as a tool to “target testing to questionable areas.” (Emphasis added.)

New Mexico RanchIn short, USDA’s contention that TB must be managed by NAIS while we continue to import the disease from Mexico is, like its similar BSE argument, most disingenuous.

Foot and mouth is another disease which Homeland Security and USDA have used as a scare tactic. Given USDA’s efforts to regionalize Argentina and the announced relocation of the Plum Island facility to Kansas, America’s heartland, the assertion that producers must now embrace NAIS to combat a potential FMD outbreak is untenable.

There may well be an outbreak of FMD. Unfortunately, it will likely be a direct result of government action: a leak from the new Kansas facility, similar to the recent breach at the Surrey facility in England; or, it will come across our border which USDA refuses to secure and in fact works to make more porous. NAIS will neither prevent nor mitigate the damage that will occur under either scenario.

The Canadian Veterinarian Journal, Vol. 50, January, 2009, contained a 60-page report on the containment of England’s 2001 FMD outbreak. England has long had an animal ID system; however, that system and “traceback” was not the key to FMD containment in 2001.

The 2001 FMD outbreak was handled by throwing up perimeters and then, with locals, working in from the perimeter. Similarly, states have existing plans for handling emergencies which would include a FMD outbreak. Such an outbreak would be handled as it was in England: a perimeter would be established with no movement inside the perimeter as the necessary epidemiology work would then be done from the perimeter inward.

Animal ID was not utilized to contain the 2001 FMD outbreak nor would it be of any meaningful benefit were this nation to suffer an outbreak. Further, it would not identify vehicles and individuals who have been in contact with contaminated herds; hence, the establishment of a perimeter with work then directed inward.

Even with TB, a perimeter is established and work is then done inward. USDA’s handling of the current TB situation in Nebraska well illustrates this point. NAIS would not alter the course of the investigation.

USDA claims that NAIS is vital in the case of TB as some investigations have taken up to 160 days. Again, the current Nebraska situation is instructive. A perimeter is established and herds are investigated within that perimeter.

What have been possible contacts with the infected herd and what has happened in the last 12 24 months with neighboring herds and cohorts? USDA postures that the livestock industry has no records, no idea of where calves may have been sold or cull cows sent.

USDA adduces no evidence to support that assertion beyond its claim of an investigation of up to 160 days in length. USDA never details what it did in that 160 period and how much investigative time was on issues for which NAIS would have been of no benefit.

Producers have records and so do states. Arizona is a brand state. It has a record of every animal that has left our ranch, where it went, and who the trucker was. We have similar records. USDA is simply misrepresenting the state of the livestock industry.

Border interdiction of disease and running a closed herd–which we do in our operation–are the two best defenses against the introduction of disease. NAIS is of no benefit to us as producers.

2. USDA has neither statutory nor constitutional authority for the imposition of NAIS; indeed, NAIS represents the implementation of the OIE Terrestrial Animal Health Code and the Codex Alimentarius, the adaptation of which is a treaty action never ratified by the Senate as required by Article II, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution.

USDA has received repeated requests from multiple organizations for a specific citation of authority for NAIS. It has never responded, beyond a generic reference to the Animal Health Protection Act of 2002 coupled with a broad assertion of authority to “carry out operations and measures to protect the health of American Agriculture.”

That assertion is apparently from 7 USC 8308 and has been taken completely out of context. That section authorizes USDA to “carry out operations and measures to detect, control, or eradicate any pest or disease of livestock (including the drawing of blood and diagnostic testing of animals), including animals at a slaughterhouse, stockyard, or other

point of concentration.” (Emphasis added.)

The statutory examples of “operations and measures” are of overt action by USDA such as drawing of blood and diagnostic testing, all directly intended to “detect, control, or eradicate” pests or diseases. The statutory construction doctrines of ejusdem generis and noscitur a sociis require the general terms “operations and measures” to be construed in light of the specific terms “drawing of blood and diagnostic testing.”

The language most certainly does not confer broad authority to mandate overt action by producers in the form of an animal ID system designed to track livestock movement; that does not directly and actively “detect, control, or eradicate” pests or diseases; and which certainly is not a measure such as “drawing of blood and diagnostic testing.”

Any fair reading of the Act does not permit the assertion of authority by USDA for NAIS. Further, USDA’s assertion of broad authority cannot be countenanced under any fair reading of the United States Constitution. The powers of Congress are not implied, plenary, and inherent, but rather express, limited and enumerated. USDA’s assertion that Congress has delegated and granted it broad powers which are implied, plenary and inherent flies in the face of the clear intent of Article 1, Section 8, of the U.S. Constitution.

USDA is an administrative agency under the Executive branch of the federal government and enjoys no powers beyond those expressly granted it by Congress, acting in turn under the express, limited, and enumerated powers granted under Article 1, Section 8.

As noted above, USDA is essentially seeking to implement OIE’s Terrestrial Animal Health Code and the Codex Alimentarius by administrative fiat. Both Codes are a complex web of international agreements and actions by numerous countries. http://www.oie.int/eng/OIE/en_histoire.htm?e1d1; http://www.oie.int/eng/OIE/organisation/en_structure.htm?e1d1; http://www.oie.int/eng/OIE/actes/en_accords.htm

The net effect of an implementation of NAIS by administrative fiat would be the enforcement upon American producers of international standards agreed to by various countries. Those standards are, in essence, treaties much like the free trade agreements which required the consent of the Senate. That body has never considered the agreements comprising the two codes.

The very fact of disagreement between producers and USDA over the necessity of NAIS underscores the need for transparent debate, deliberation, and consideration by the Senate.

Even if the two codes are not construed as treaties, they are most certainly a regulation of commerce with foreign nations, a power reserved to Congress, not to USDA as an administrative agency under the executive branch of government. USDA simply has no power, statutorily or constitutionally, to mandate NAIS.

3. The regulatory and enforcement provisions of NAIS are unknown and its underlying premise is suspect.

Inherent in NAIS is the assumption of an errorless system; i.e., that i) no cattle will ever lose ear tags, ii) that the tags will always function and not succumb to the effects of weather and sun, iii) that all dead and missing cattle can be accounted for, iv) that all movements of cattle can and will be accurately scanned, v) that the data so scanned will always be properly registered, vi) that the data so uploaded will always be properly received vii) that the data so received will be always be properly recorded and viii) that the data will always be retrievable.

USDA has no concept of the conditions under which cattle producers operate, how cattle are handled, what facilities will actually be required to read and scan tags, of weather–heat, cold, wet, dry, dust–under which NAIS would function. It has no concept of a lack of internet access to upload information. The errorless system envisioned by USDA is simply not a real world scenario.

There is no duplication or redundancy as is the case in our present system. The concept of 48-hour trace back, while beguiling, is actually inferior to the present system due to the duplication and redundancy in the existing system.

England has experienced problems with its ID program with a cow herd that is substantially smaller than the U.S. herd. According to a November, 2003, House of Commons Report, the entire population of cattle, sheep and pigs in England was a mere 25 million. In contrast, there are nearly 100 million cattle in the United States.

The livestock industry in England is on a much smaller scale than in the U.S.; yet, according to the October 12, 2008, issue of the Telegraph,

In a situation described as udder chaos, officials at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) admitted in Parliamentary questions that 20,979 of the animals had been mislaid.

The livestock should have been logged on Defra’s Cattle Tracing System, devised to protect public and animal health after the BSE and foot and mouth epidemics.

However the cattle have disappeared from the system, while another 1039 are believed to have been loaded onto cattle trucks and never heard of again, according to the Daily Star.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/3182720/Defra-admits-losing-20000-cows-in-Britain.html

The same article noted that Britain’s Ministry of Defence had lost a computer hard drive containing the private details of 100,000 members of the Armed Forces and that the Home Office had lost a memory stick containing data on 84,000 prisoners in England and Wales.

Such experiences are not unique to England. USDA itself has had similar incidents.

In 2007, USDA inadvertently published the social security numbers of 63,000 people on the internet. http://www.technewsworld.com/story/security/57029.html?wlc=1243391840

Also in 2007, USDA had computers stolen containing sensitive information about farmers. http://seclists.org/isn/2007/Mar/0060.html

In 2006, USDA’s office of Inspector General, in its annual audit, concluded that the “Agriculture Department continues to suffer from inadequate management and monitoring of IT security controls, both at the department-level and in its agencies.” http://gcn.com/articles/2006/10/20/usda-security-improvements-still-not-effective-ig.aspx

Indeed, USDA has been given the lowest possible marks for 5 straight years on federal computer report card grades by the House Government Reform Committee. http://www.internetnews.com/security/article.php/3615831

John Carter, former chairman of the Australian Beef Association and whose family holds the oldest registered brand in that country, reports that 20% of the cattle in the NLIS data base are missing; that a personal audit of his NLIS data base shows that less than 50% of the animals he has sold are so reflected in the data base; than a “trace back trial” of 300 head of cattle could track only 75% and that the remaining 25% could be tracked only through Australia’s traditional “paper trail.” Carter states that NLIS has “produced a shambles.”

The notion that NAIS is a technologically feasible means of tracing 100 million head of cattle is not supported by existing evidence. USDA’s own record with computers, theft, hacking and other security breaches coupled with animal ID experiences in England and Australia well demonstrate that it is a system that should be rejected.

What will happen when cattle movements are not accurately scanned, registered, transmitted, or received? There will be discrepancies and irregularities in data. How heavy handed will USDA be in such instances? Most producers have experience with federal agencies and in many cases, it is not favorable.

In our own experience, dealing with TB in New Mexico, we have found the agency and its rules to be heavy handed with demands which, by its own admission, have no rational basis.

USDA has given no indication to producers of how NAIS will be enforced and discrepancies/irregularities handled. If England is any indication, producers can expect heavy-handed enforcement.

According to London’s Telegraph, Cheshire dairyman David Dobbins had 567 head of dairy cattle destroyed by DEFRA as a consequence of ID paperwork “irregularities” notwithstanding that DEFRA “failed to explain how many or what these were.” Prior to the destruction of the animals. Mr. Dobbins records were seized by DEFRA, negating his ability to even respond to DEFRA’s noncompliance assertions. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1545862/Christopher-Bookers-notebook.html

One fears that NAIS will bring similar events upon the heads of this nation’s cattle producers

4. USDA has spent well in excess of $140 million promoting premises registration and NAIS. This expenditure is most irresponsible at a time when this nation is–in essence–bankrupt. This nation simply cannot afford any more such frivolous expenditures.

In the face of the hundreds of billions and indeed trillions of dollars which the Federal Government has thrown about the last several months, USDA’s NAIS expenditures are minuscule. Nevertheless, it is an expenditure of money which the federal government simply does not have.

The May 30, 2009, issue of USA Today reported numbers previously discussed in various sources by David Walker, former U.S. Comptroller General who resigned in disgust following Congressional inaction on his annual report to Congress. The total unfunded liabilities of the Federal Government now total a record $63.8 trillion, a sum equal to $546,668 for every U.S. household!

Estimates are that only around 1% of U.S. households have a net worth sufficient to pay their proportionate share of the $63.8 trillion in debt. In short, this nation is bankrupt.

Continued spending on NAIS, a program for which, as discussed above, no need has ever been demonstrated is simply irresponsible given this nation’s financial condition.

NAIS should immediately be terminated and not a single additional dollar spent thereon.

5. USDA has no credibility with producers and there is no on the ground support for NAIS, without which it simply cannot succeed.

At all of the listening sessions–through Albuquerque on June 16–two salient facts emerged: there is widespread mistrust of USDA among producers and there is virtually no producer support for NAIS. A chasm, a gulf exists between USDA and producers.

NAIS was never intended to be voluntary. Several comments in the 2005 Strategic Plan underscore this:

— NAIS must be implemented(USDA Secretary Mike Johanns)

— We have been working on an animal identification plan here at

USDA over a number of years now, and our goal

has remained consistent–to be able to track animals within a 48-

hour period. We are prepared to roll up our sleeves and get this

implemented . NAIS is a top USDA priority. (William “Bill”

Hawks Under Secretary for Marketing and Regulatory Programs)

— [W]e move forward to implement NAIS. (John R. Clifford, Deputy

Administrator Veterinary Services)

(Page 2, Strategic Plan) http://wlsb.state.wy.us/brands/Premises/brochure/NAIS_Draft_Strategic_Plan_42505.pdf

The Plan claimed that “stakeholders provide broad support for national animal identification” and in its timeline listed January, 2009, as the target date by which “Reporting of defined animal movements [will be] required; [and the] entire program [becomes] mandatory.”

USDA pulled out all stops. In Colorado, 4-H children were prohibited from showing livestock at the state fair unless their parents had registered their “premises.” Money was given to FFA in the hope of cajoling parents.

The Plan was changed to become “voluntary” and NAIS morphed from an animal health plan to a marketing tool; then it became a means of assuring consumers that their beef is wholesome–a food safety issue; finally, the trump card of bio-terrorism was played.

Four years later, and following some $140 million to register “premises”–much of it bribe money handed out to “partners” in an effort to enlist their support–only some 30% of “premises” have been registered.

In many states, however, when dairies, feeding, hog and poultry operations, are excluded, less than 10% of cattle producers have registered. Missouri is such an example.

Having played all its cards of crisis, USDA’s plan had nevertheless run amuck. There was no “stakeholder” support. USDA, fond of the term “stakeholder” had forgotten that the only real “stakeholders” were those producers on the ground who actually owned the cattle that were to be the subject of NAIS.

USDA apparently assumed that producers were red-necked bumpkins who could be coached into compliance by smooth talking bureaucrats in Brooks Brothers suits singing the soothing song of the voluntary nature of NAIS.

USDA’s next target for bamboozlement was Congress. At the March 11 NAIS hearing earlier this year before the House Agricultural Subcommittee on Livestock, Dairy and Poultry, USDA stacked the deck. The first “panel” consisted of but a single individual: APHIS’ Dr. John Clifford who was given over one hour to advocate for NAIS.

There was but a single independent cattle producer invited to give testimony, R-CALF’s Dr. Max Thornsberry, who was afforded a mere five minutes of time.

All other panel members were representatives of government (Dr. Williams and Mr. St. Cry); were representatives of groups who were had taken, directly or indirectly, bribe money from USDA to promote NAIS under the euphemism of “co-operative agreements” (Mr. Nutt, Dr. Jordan, and Mr. Butler); or were former USDA/APHIS employees (Dr. Ron DeHaven.)

Chairman Scott, during a brief discussion on foot and mouth, seized on a reference to the highly contagious nature of bovine FMD and a mention of potential airborne contamination to try and connect human health with bovine FMD. Specifically, Chairman Scott suggested that NAIS was necessary to protect humans from contracting bovine FMD. USDA’s Dr. Clifford did nothing to correct Chairman Scott’s misapprehension.

There is a human form of FMD which is “a common viral illness of infants and children” but it is “not related” to the bovine disease. (See the website for the Center for Disease Control and its discussion of the human form http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvrd/revb/enterovirus/hfhf.htm)

Misconception manifested itself again when Representative Conaway asked Dr. Clifford about the triggering event for a 48-hour traceback under NAIS. Representative Conaway’s question was in the context of a boy in Philadelphia who becomes ill after he has eaten a hamburger.

Traceback of live animals has nothing to do with traceback of E. coli, which was underlying Representative Conaway’s question. There is presently no traceback system from the consumption of meat to the processing facility or meat packing plant which would be the source of contamination. NAIS does nothing to change this: traceability would stop at the processing plant door.

As he had done with Chairman Scott and the misconception on FMD and a perceived risk to human health, Dr. Clifford did nothing to correct Representative Conaway’s erroneous conception that NAIS had something to do with tracing of E. coli in contaminated meat. In short, Dr. Clifford allowed the erroneous conception that NAIS was a human health and food safety issue to go unchallenged.

Having engaged in such misleading conduct, USDA initiated listening sessions, handing out materials including a May 7 “Dear Participant” letter under the signature of John Clifford. There are interesting phrases in that letter:

  • We need to work collaboratively to resolve concerns and move forward with animal tracebility
  • NAIS is a cooperative effort
  • Much more work is needed to fully implement NAIS
  • Together we can develop a system that we an all support.

Inherent in those phrases is a determination on the part of USDA to proceed with NAIS, notwithstanding total producer opposition thereto. Producers will be spun as rejecting the reasonable overtures of a wise USDA. The platitude of wanting to listen and hear producer input is a velvet glove masking an iron fist.

Several states have statutes prohibiting a mandatory NAIS. How will that be handled? In a system of federalism, does USDA really have ultimate authority over livestock? Does Article 1, Section 8, of the federal Constitution in fact negative much of the Animal Health Protection Act relied on by USDA? At the Albuquerque listening session, one Navajo speaker suggested that the tribes may not accept a mandatory NAIS. How will the issue of tribal sovereignty be resolved? Does USDA really wish to force a constitutional confrontation on these points?

USDA may mandate NAIS but in the process will further alienate producers. The existing gulf will become an unbridgeable chasm. Enforcement will make criminals of law abiding citizens as producers are jailed and their property subjected to confiscatory fines to coerce compliance. Is this what USDA truly desires?

In our operation, we will simply not comply with NAIS, even if it is made mandatory. We are weary of an intrusive government and the fights associated therewith. Rather than continuing to submit to intrusive, heavy-handed regulation, we would choose to exit the business. There is no joy in serfdom on one’s own land and with one’s own animals.

We respectfully urge Secretary Vilsack to close down shop with NAIS and to began a new dawn of rebuilding bridges with producers, working with us rather than with industrialized agriculture, to fulfill USDA’s express statutory mandate and be about the business of improving “the quality of life for people living in the rural and nonmetropolitan regions of the nation.” 7 USC 2204 (a).

That mandate is a true cooperative effort, one that can be achieved without the expenditure of vast sums of money, without onerous regulations but rather by simply working to rehabilitate commodity markets, restoring them as true markets where prices reflect supply and demand and not the oligopsonistic bargaining power and market manipulation by industrialized agriculture coupled with speculation by hedge funds and individuals who have never and will never own a cow.

As producers, our livelihood is more dependent on fixing broken domestic markets than it is on expanding foreign markets and implementing an ID system that provides a false sense of security for herd health.

Stop NAIS now and actually help producers do what they do best: produce. Currently, USDA’s policies would castrate and bid the gelding be fruitful.

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This family says – “No more fairs”

They say a government program violates their private-property rights.

Cassidy Younggreen, 13, won awards for her goats at the Boulder County Fair last year, but this year she and her brother Ryan wont be there. They raise 30 goats, two llamas and 15 chickens.

Cassidy Younggreen, 13, won awards for her goats at the Boulder County Fair last year, but this year she and her brother Ryan won't be there. They raise 30 goats, two llamas and 15 chickens.

BROOMFIELD — Cassidy and Ryan Young-green won a passel of ribbons in the Boulder County Fair last year, carrying on a family tradition of putting their livestock up against any comers in annual county-fair competitions.

But this year, Cassidy, 13, and Ryan, 11, aren’t showing anything at the Boulder County Fair — not even their award-winning goats — because they would be forced to participate in an intrusive new government program, said their mom, Kellyjo Younggreen.

“They tell us you have to register, you have to register,” Younggreen said. “But I think this just goes too far.”

Some other farm families in Colorado feel the same way about a national animal-identification program that they say is a violation of private-property rights.

They are refusing to let their children enter their livestock in fair competitions — including those in Adams, Arapahoe, Boulder, Larimer and Weld counties and the Colorado State Fair — where entries must comply with the National Animal Identification System. NAIS is a U.S. Department of Agriculture initiative designed to help regulators track animal diseases.

“There are several instances of families across the state who are simply saying no,” said John Reid, a cattle operator in Ordway and member of the Colorado Independent CattleGrowers Association. “There is overwhelming opposition to this initiative everywhere.”

But proponents say the ID program will help prevent a national outbreak of livestock disease. Fair organizers also point out protesting families are few and far between.

In fact, they say, the number of fair participants is actually up this year.

“It seems pretty isolated to maybe two families and a (4-H) club or two,” said Richard Biella, president of the Boulder County Fair board.

Biella, too, was skeptical of the ID plan. But as an owner of Angus cattle, he became a fan because he says it could prevent health problems afflicting entire operations.

Cassidy Younggreen, 13, won awards for her goats at the Boulder County Fair last year, but this year she and her brother Ryan wont be there. They raise 30 goats, two llamas and 15 chickens.

Cassidy Younggreen, 13, won awards for her goats at the Boulder County Fair last year, but this year she and her brother Ryan won't be there. They raise 30 goats, two llamas and 15 chickens.

“I understand some people don’t feel comfortable with the program,” Biella said. “But truly, if the government wanted to find out about us, they only have to look at our license plates, punch in a couple of numbers, and they’d get all they wanted.”

At the center of the NAIS are premises identification numbers, or PINs. When livestock owners register for a PIN, they must give basic contact information as well as what species of animals are on their property and the type of operation.

So far, the system is voluntary. But a handful of county fairs in Colorado this year are requiring PIN registration for 4-H livestock that might go to market.

The state fair also requires PIN registration, but that hasn’t stopped 4-H families from entering competitions, said Gwen Bosley, animal ID coordinator at the Colorado Department of Agriculture.

“There are a lot of misconceptions out there about what this is all about,” Bosley said. “But once you explain that it is simply a way to protect animals from an animal health emergency, people understand. There might be a handful of families in the state who have dropped out of fairs because of this, but that’s about it.”

Kellyjo Younggreen, however, said a national ID program will only favor corporate farms because only one animal will be registered out of a whole section of the same breed of animals. Small operators like her — with a 5-acre operation of mostly chickens, rabbits and goats — will have to tag each animal.

The possible expense of such a program — and the notion her family’s operation will be part of a massive government database — makes her nervous.

“I just don’t like the scare tactics the government is using,” Younggreen said. “It feels like we are being forced into something we don’t need.”

Monte Whaley: 720-929-0907 or mwhaley@denverpost.com

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To Control E. Choli – We Need Meat ID, not Cow ID

Daryll E. Ray and the Agricultural Policy Analysis Center, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN

Food safety has been getting a lot of attention lately. In response to the peanut butter, pistachio, and toll house cookie recalls, the House Energy and Safety Committee has approved the Food Safety Enforcement Act of 2009 to strengthen and expand the US Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) role in food safety and inspection. To gauge the response of the agricultural community, the House Agriculture Committee held a hearing on this legislation.

At the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue, a White House Food Safety Group was formed by the Obama administration. In July 2009, the Working Group recommended “a new, public health-focused approach to food safety based on three core principles: (1) prioritizing prevention; (2) strengthening surveillance and enforcement; and (3) improving response and recovery”

(http://www.foodsafetyworkinggroup.gov/FSWG_Fact_Sheet.pdf).

In all this, major-crop and livestock farmers are worried that the move toward increased emphasis on food safety will lead to the FDA inspection of farms as part of its role in protecting the integrity of the food ingredients that are produced by farmers. Many involved in beef production are resistant to an animal identification system that would allow traceback to the farm-level.

At the same time, the meat industry, having freed itself from a government-directed inspection through the use of Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point program (HACCP), wants to prevent a move back to a greater government involvement in the inspection of meat and meat products.

When considering issues of major importance to a sector–which this one definitely is in the case of agriculture–the rhetoric sometimes out-distances the the reality of the arguments made and fears generated.

In the case of E. coli in beef, there is nothing that cattlemen can or cannot do that will materially affect the probability of E. coli showing up in your hamburger. There is some evidence that taking cattle off the feedlot for a period of time and putting them on pasture prior to slaughter reduces the level but does not eliminate the presence of E. coli and therefore its potential for contamination. So there is no reason for the FDA to use valuable resources to visit cattle ranches or feeding operations as part of “beefing-up” prevention of E. coli contamination from beef.

Since what happens on ranches and feedlots has no effect on whether beef ultimately becomes contaminated with E. coli, traceback to production agriculture–that is, an animal identification system–is not needed to protect consumers from E. coli.

That is not to say that an animal ID program is, or is not, appropriate for other reasons. Recent arguments for animal traceback are primarily concerned with bovine spongiform encephalopathy (Mad Cow disease). While that may be an important issue, it is unrelated to the E. coli discussion.

Traceback is required, of course, but it is MEAT traceback that is needed, not animal traceback.

Meat traceback is needed because E. coli O157:H7 grows in the gut of beef animals, the food safety issue concerns the prevention of the contamination of slaughtered meat from sources like intestines and hides.

When E. coli O157:H7 is found in ground beef or on beef muscle meat surfaces, the problem is one that originates at the packing plant. Since the institution of the HACCP system in meat inspection, the USDA has focused its enforcement at downline facilities that process boxed beef into hamburger and resisted tracing the contamination back to the packing plant that produced the boxed beef.

The USDA has done this despite the knowledge that a processing facility that does no slaughtering lacks a source of E. coli O157:H7. The most likely source of the E. coli is on the surface of meat that came in from the slaughterhouse, thus the need for meat traceback.

The rhetoric of those speaking for meat packers and processors tend to steer attention away from the central issue. James Hodges of the American Meat Institute Foundation makes statements like “No outbreaks of E. coli O157:H7 have been linked to whole muscle cuts like steaks and roasts.” Similarly, the North American Meat Processors Association (NAMP) sent out a 2008 NewsFax release saying “NAMP knows of no illness that has resulted from the consumption of intact beef product.”

The issue is not the consumption of steaks, roasts, and intact beef product. Everyone acknowledges that heating the outside of those products to 160 degrees kills E. coli 0157:H7. Rather the problem comes from the fact that the presence of E. coli O157:H7 on the surface of primals is not considered an adulterant. That presence raises the opportunity for cross contamination with other foods or the incorporation of E. coli present on the surface of intact cuts into ground beef.

Cutting through the rhetoric, it seems clear that the USDA can significantly reduce the number of E. coli illnesses by declaring E. coli O157:H7 on the surface of primals to be a contaminant that must be eliminated as part of the slaughtering process and by instituting a meat traceback system that will trace contaminated ground beef back to the packing plant that provided it.

Daryll E. Ray holds the Blasingame Chair of Excellence in Agricultural Policy, Institute of Agriculture, University of Tennessee, and is the Director of UT’s Agricultural Policy Analysis Center (APAC). Daryll Ray’s column is written with the research and assistance of Harwood D. Schaffer, Research Associate with APAC.

agpolicy.org

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NAIS — It Ain’t Over Until The Fat Lady Sings

Written by: Chuck JolleyCattle Network

She belts one out on Monday. Except ‘she’ will be a couple of he’s — Brooks and Dunn singing ‘That ain’t no way to go.’

The heavily promoted comment period for the U.S.D.A.’s National Animal Identification System (N.A.I.S.) listening tour will end on Monday. According to the U.S.D.A., comments received on or before this date will be considered. Hopefully written comments received after the final Omaha meeting will be taken more seriously than spoken comments were during the ‘live,’ face-to-face meetings.

“While the roundtables and public listening sessions are complete, I encourage those of you who still would like to share your concerns and suggestions about N.A.I.S. to submit your written comments by August 3,” said Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack, “We look forward to considering all the feedback before deciding on the future direction of U.S.D.A.’s traceability efforts.”

U.S.D.A. has posted a feedback page on the N.A.I.S. Web site. Whether you’re your for it or against it, go to www.usda.gov/nais/feedback now to provide your suggestions and comments.

If Vilsack is counting noses, N.A.I.S. will be deep-sixed on August 4. He announced the listening tour on May 15 as a way to find common ground for the development of the always controversial program. To be painfully blunt, common ground never existed. Only a pitifully small handful of people stood up for a national program during the 14 city tour. The vast majority of the often overly enthusiastic crowd spoke against N.A.I.S. using very specific and occasionally salty language. Trying to talk those people into accepting an animal identification program will be tougher than talking a card-carrying N.R.A. member out of his gun.

In fact, more than a few N.R.A. card-carrying farmers have promised to show anyone representing NAIS who dares step foot on his or her property a personal collection of fire arms. Barrel end first.

As a voluntary program, N.A.I.S. might have worked but only with the strongest possible assurances from the U.S.D.A. that ‘voluntary’ isn’t code for ‘mandatory’ within a few short years. Even that approach would be a hard sell as most of the speakers were outspoken about their innate distrust of anything that smacked of “Hello, I’m from the government and I’m here to help you.”

These are people who are used to doing it themselves. If any help is needed, it’s neighbor-to-neighbor, not federales to farmers. The mistake the USDA made was trying to organize this program from the top down. Going after the cooperation of state ag agencies and trade associations, they assumed, would win the day and the big boys did fall in line, lured by the promise of an ever expanding foreign trade opportunity. NAIS, though, is a bottom up program. It can only succeed with the consent and cooperation of the hundreds of thousands of small farmers from Portland, ME to Portland OR.

They said no.

If there is any confusion about the meaning of that word, maybe the U.S.D.A. can understand it a little better by clicking here.

Chuck Jolley is a free lance writer, based in Kansas City, who covers a wide range of ag industry topics for Cattlenetwork.com and Agnetwork.com.

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The Amazing Failure of NAIS

Written by Harlan Hentges

Thursday, 23 July 2009 14:38

About the Author

Mr. Hentges is a 1992 graduate of the University of Texas with a juris doctorate from the School of Law and a Master of Public Affairs from the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs. He is a 1987 graduate of Oklahoma State University with a bachelor of science in agricultural economics.

He is admitted to practice law in the States of Oklahoma and Texas and the Federal District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma. He is a member of the Oklahoma Bar Association, the Oklahoma County Bar Association and the American Agricultural Law Association.

Mr. Hentges’s legal practice is concentrated in agricultural law, civil litigation, Endangered Species Act, eminent domain and appellate law.

Phone: (405) 340 6554

Harlan Hentges P. L. L. C.

1015G Waterwood Parkway Ste F1

Edmond, OK 73034

The National Animal Identification System (NAIS) would have gathered and introduced a huge amount of new data into the food supply chain. Data is very valuable in any supply chain and would certainly be valuable to food. USDA had the power and resources of the US government and support of multinational corporations that dominate the U. S. meat market. Under these circumstances, getting data into the food supply chain should have been like shooting fish in a barrel. Instead it was an amazing failure. Why?

I submit that USDA and their industry partners have a common flaw in structure, leadership and management. The flaw causes them to be blind to social, cultural and economic values of food and farming . After several years and hundreds of millions of dollars, USDA continues to face fierce public opposition to NAIS and members of congress have declared NAIS a failure and have moved to eliminate funding. The failure of NAIS reveals a flaw and its potentially negative consequences for the food supply chain.

For at least four decades the U. S. consumer and producer have expressed a preference for a food and farming system that is consistent with their social and cultural values. In the 1970’s the American Agricultural Movement radically protested the loss of farms. In the 1980’s Farm Aid lamented the loss of farms. The 1990’s saw the growth of organic foods and specialized stores like Whole Foods and Wild Oats. The 2000’shave movements such as local food, real food, raw food, slow food, vegetarian, and vegan. All of these movements and many more are vocal, national, well-publicized and they express the desire for food that is consistent with social and cultural values. Even the Pope writes about the lack of social and cultural values in our food system.

The only way to add social and cultural value to food is to provide consumers with information about their food . Valuable information would include where it was produced, by whom and under what conditions. This would permit consumers to know if the food they purchase is consistent with their values and enable them to act on those values.

When USDA and its multinational corporate partners under took the implementation of NAIS, they ignored virtually all of the value information might have to the food supply chain. They focused on only one objective — to track and, if needed, control the movement of every animal in the U. S. They claimed that in the event a disease was discovered in the U. S. every exposed animal could be identified, located, and quarantined or destroyed. This ability would benefit only one segment of the food supply chain, the large meat packers. By controlling the movement of animals, the slaughter facilities could continued to operate with as little disruption as possible . Theoretically, saving the packers as much downtime would justify the cost of the system.

Despite a ubiquitous desire for food that is consistent with social and cultural values, USDA and the multinationals designed NAIS so that any information about the animal was lost at the slaughter facility . Information about the source of the animal would never be available to a consumer . Information about the customer’s satisfaction could not be available to the farmer.

It is apparent that USDA and the multinationals failed to consider that information would be valuable to the producer or the consumer. This failure is inexcusable. The values of food and farming are thoroughly addressed in books like Fast Food Nation and Omnivore’s Dilemma and films like Food, Inc. and Fresh. It is undeniable that there is a widespread concern, and in some cases outrage, that industrialized agriculture is responsible for the decline of rural economies and communities, economic oppression of farmers, environmental degradation and mistreatment of animals. Yet USDA and the multinationals act as if information about where, by whom and how food is raised is irrelevant to the food supply chain and the value of food.

USDA and the multinationals failure to recognize the value of information about food is really a failure to recognize the value of food. USDA and the multinationals failed, I submit, because they do not know why food is valuable. Food is not valuable because of its nutritional content. Food is valuable because it comes from one of many economically viable farmers who live nearby and can produce a supply of food that is safe and secure for the long term. It is valuable because it is provided through supply chain that functions freely and is not subject to foreign, corporate or governmental control. Food is valuable because it comes from animals and crops that are genetically diverse so that they are not all susceptible to the same disease. Food is valuable because it is produced with farming methods that preserve the productivity of the land and produces offspring and seeds for the following year. Food is valuable because it is consistent with moral, social and economic values that sustain communities indefinitely. The amazing failure of NAIS indicates that the USDA and the multinationals do not understand or do not share these values.

Due to USDA’s power and the multinationals to influence the nation’s and world’s food supply, this lack of understanding of the value of food is a huge obstacle. Nonetheless, the challenge and opportunity in agriculture and food markets is to provide this value despite USDA’s policies and the market power of multinationals. Each food recall, each disease outbreak, each bankrupt farmer, and each contaminated water body is a new and better opportunity and a greater challenge to provide food of greater value.

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Wisconsin’s war against agriculture: Fines, imprisonment and property seizure

July 23, 2009

By Marti Oakley (Food Freedom)

Paul Griepentrog inside the greenhouseThe first thing they did when they got the authority to write rules … was to grant themselves the authority to conduct warrantless searches. Wisconsin is in the process of coercing farmers and backyard producers … into NAIS, and the accompanying Premises ID program, by threatening to withhold any of the licenses they control.” Paul Griepentrog

In the course of researching various topics, running down leads on information and ferreting out the plans behind the public propaganda used to infringe on one right after another, I sometimes stumble across someone who has so much verifiable information, I am left astounded.  This was the case when I happened across a gentleman farmer named Paul Griepentrog while researching the laws and bills about Premises ID and the National Animal Identification System (NAIS).

I already knew the mandatory law had been bought and paid for in Wisconsin through the use of a USDA “cooperative agreement” to the tune of $35 million.

In a recent interview I asked Paul to answer a few questions about what is really happening to Wisconsin residents who are being forced onto these illegal programs:

Q:  Does the Animal Health Protection Act of 2003 actually authorize the Animal Identification System or Premises ID?

A: There is nothing in that bill giving them authority to create or establish the National Animal Identification System (NAIS).  That law has been misquoted saying that it is the authority for NAIS.  We have repeatedly sent letters to USDA and Tom Vilsack asking him to show the section of that law that gives the authority but he refuses to answer or acknowledge the letters.

Q: Has the USDA, in collusion with the Wisconsin AG department, threatened any farms that you know of?

A: Dwayne Brander on behalf of Dr. McGraw, Assistant State Veterinarian, goes out to farms telling them that if they don’t renew or register their premises in the State of Wisconsin they will file suit against them for failing to comply, using the county DA and calling it a civil forfeiture.

Wisconsin is in the process of coercing farmers and backyard producers in an effort to force them onto NAIS and the accompanying Premises ID program by threatening to withhold any of the licenses they control and would refuse to give the license unless you signed up.

Q: Is there a part of the law in Wisconsin that allows for fines and imprisonment based on the sole allegations of these agencies or representative personnel from USDA or DATCP in Wisconsin?

A: Here is section 95 from the Wisconsin bill implementing the “voluntary” NAIS/Premises ID law:

CHAPTER 95

ANIMAL HEALTH

95.23 Disease investigation and enforcement.

95.23(1)

(1) Authorized inspectors and agents of the department may enter at reasonable times any premises, building or place to investigate the existence of animal diseases or to investigate violations of or otherwise enforce the laws relating to animal health. Any animals or materials suspected of being infected may be examined or tested. No person shall obstruct or interfere with such investigation or enforcement work, or attempt to do so, in any manner, by threat or otherwise.

95.23(2)

(2) Upon request of an authorized inspector or agent of the department, sheriffs and police officers shall assist in the enforcement of the laws relating to animal health.

95.99 Penalties.

95.99(1)

(1) Any person who violates this chapter, or an order issued or a rule adopted under this chapter, for which a specific penalty is not prescribed shall, for the first offense, be fined not more than $1,000; and for any subsequent offense fined not less than $500 nor more than $1,000, or imprisoned not more than 6 months or both.

95.99(2)

(2) The department may seek an injunction restraining any person from violating this chapter or any rule promulgated under this chapter.

95.99(3)

(3) A person who violates this chapter or any rule promulgated or order issued under this chapter, for which a specific penalty is not prescribed, may be required to forfeit not less than $200 nor more than $5,000 for the first offense and may be required to forfeit not less than $400 nor more than $5,000 for the 2nd or subsequent offense committed within 5 years of an offense for which a penalty has been assessed under this section. A forfeiture under this subsection is in lieu of a criminal penalty under sub.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Q: Do citizens have the right to demand a full disclosure of the exact laws and basis under which USDA and Wisconsin have charged them?  Is there any defense against these attacks?

A: There seems to be none.  In the cooperative agreement it states all applicable federal laws shall apply.  There are certain major State and Federal Constitutional issues that these laws are in conflict with.

Q: Who exactly is asking for this information?

A: The Department of Agriculture, State of Wisconsin administered by Assistant State Veterinarian, Dr. Paul McGraw; both knowing this has nothing to do with livestock or food safety.  This comes from The World Trade Organization and their trade program OIE. http://www.oie.int/eng/en_index.htm World Organization Animal Health.

Q: Where is the information stored? For what purpose?

A: Initially intake is at state level, and then it moves through forms records management plan.  There are different steps on how they process this information.  From everything I read, a disease outbreak would give state, federal and international interest’s access.

Q: Who is storing the information?

A: Wisconsin Department of Agriculture and then to Wisconsin Livestock Identification Consortium with (WLIC) as final repository in Canada. The WLIC is comprised of various agriculture groups, breed associations and companies selling RFID tags.

Rep. Obey & Sen. Kohl helped to get WLIC started and moved the data base to Canada.  The head of WLIC initially was Gary Tauchen who is now a Wisconsin representative and sitting on the house AG committee.

In my own case, I have been registered twice after the fire number on my property changed.  Once under the original number and my name and again under the newly assigned number and my farm name; I did not register for Premises ID on either occasion and was signed up without my knowledge or consent.

Q: If the WLIC is listed as the last repository of data mined information, how did files on Wisconsin agricultural properties end up being stored in Canada?

A: WLIC with the help of Rep. Obey and Sen. Kohl although I don’t know for sure how this was accomplished. The intention was to avoid any Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request or open information requests until they passed the 2008 Farm Bill and included a provision in that bill saying that these files would not be available to FOIA requests.

Q.  Who had access to these files when they were outside the country?

A:  We don’t know.  Once it was outside US jurisdiction we had no way of knowing.

Q:  Are you able to get copies of your personal file from the Canadian data bank?

A:  I was able to obtain the premises information pursuant to the forms records management plan.  To my knowledge I am only the second person to do so.

Q:  We know these programs have nothing to do with tracking animal disease and are actually meant to end competition for industrialized agricultural interests, and to seize control of agricultural lands and livestock….who are the actual players that will benefit from these programs?

A: The big corporate industrialized agriculture operators….Cargill, Tyson, Monsanto and others, because they would see the end to competition and obtain virtually full control over all agriculture.

Q:  Are Wisconsin politicians either state or federal willing to speak to you about NAIS, Premises ID or the fake food safety bills?

A: On the Federal level, Sen. Kohl and Rep. Obey will not take my calls.

(*Writer’s note: I made my own calls to these offices and when I stated what I was calling in reference to, the staffers got really nasty and then hung up)

In fact Sen. Kohl’s staffer, Kim Cates’ husband is on the Agriculture Consumer Protection Citizen board.  He would not even meet with John Kinsman of Family Farm Defenders to discuss the issue.

On the state level are the continuous lies.  These people will say Premises ID has nothing to do with NAIS.  They say this even though they have been shown the cooperative agreement between USDA and Wisconsin DATCP outlining Premises ID as the first step.  They refuse to look at or acknowledge the legal documents.

DATCP had a document on the Wisconsin Legislative information Bureau site saying that the Amish don’t have any problem with this.  If the Amish don’t have a problem with it why are they suing Emmanuel Miller Jr., an Amish from Clark County?

Steve Kagen would not address our concerns and he’s on the US house Ag sub- committee that held a hearing on NAIS and is also involved in the food safety bills and won’t address our concerns even there.  He is working right now to get funding to move Wisconsin into phase II of NAIS which is the mandatory chipping and tagging of all animals.

I will say that Sen. Feingold has been willing to listen to our concerns both in his Washington office and in the state office.

montages photobucketAlthough there is a bill in Wisconsin which would restore voluntary participation I feel it is nothing more than an attempt at political redemption by the same people who passed the mandatory bill to begin with, in that they are fully aware that this bills will be sent to the House Ag committee and never see the light of day.  This is merely political posturing…. The house, senate and government are all controlled by Democrats.  This may be nothing more than a smoke screen while they make mandatory phase II which is the tagging and chipping, which can’t be done unless you have a Premises ID.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Paul Griepentrog shows that, in the end, what was billed and sold to Wisconsin farmers and herders as a strictly “voluntary” system turns out to be a mandatory system operated much like a police state enforcement policy.  There can be no doubt, especially in light of the hyped up investigation and enforcement policies that this law in Wisconsin is less about disease and more about property seizure and forfeiture.

Wisconsin is the blueprint for the remaining states:  what happens there is going to happen to all independent ranchers, farmers and producers across the country if any of these fake food safety bills, or National Animal Identification System (NAIS) is passed into law.

© 2009 Marti Oakley

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Wisconsin’s war against agriculture: Fines, imprisonment and property seizure

By Marti Oakley (Food Freedom)

Paul  Griepentrog  inside  the  greenhouseThe first thing they did when they got the authority to write rules… was to grant themselves the authority to conduct warrantless searches. Wisconsin is in the process of coercing farmers and backyard producers … into NAIS, and the accompanying Premises ID program, by threatening to withhold any of the licenses they control.” Paul Griepentrog

In the course of researching various topics, running down leads on information and ferreting out the plans behind the public propaganda used to infringe on one right after another, I sometimes stumble across someone who has so much verifiable information, I am left astounded. This was the case when I happened across a gentleman farmer named Paul Griepentrog while researching the laws and bills about Premises ID and the National Animal Identification System (NAIS).

I already knew the mandatory law had been bought and paid for in Wisconsin through the use of a USDA “cooperative agreement” to the tune of $35 million.

In a recent interview I asked Paul to answer a few questions about what is really happening to Wisconsin residents who are being forced onto these illegal programs:

Q: Does the Animal Health Protection Act of 2003 actually authorize the Animal Identification System or Premises ID?

A:There is nothing in that bill giving them authority to create or establish the National Animal Identification System (NAIS). That law has been misquoted saying that it is the authority for NAIS. We have repeatedly sent letters to USDA and Tom Vilsack asking him to show the section of that law that gives the authority but he refuses to answer or acknowledge the letters.

Q: Has the USDA, in collusion with the Wisconsin AG department, threatened any farms that you know of?

A: Dwayne Brander on behalf of Dr. McGraw, Assistant State Veterinarian, goes out to farms telling them that if they don’t renew or register their premises in the State of Wisconsin they will file suit against them for failing to comply, using the county DA and calling it a civil forfeiture.

Wisconsin is in the process of coercing farmers and backyard producers in an effort to force them onto NAIS and the accompanying Premises ID program by threatening to withhold any of the licenses they control and would refuse to give the license unless you signed up.

Q: Is there a part of the law in Wisconsin that allows for fines and imprisonment based on the sole allegations of these agencies or representative personnel from USDA or DATCP in Wisconsin?

A: Here is section 95 from the Wisconsin bill implementing the “voluntary” NAIS/Premises ID law:

CHAPTER 95

ANIMAL HEALTH

95.23 Disease investigation and enforcement.

95.23(1)

(1) Authorized inspectors and agents of the department may enter at reasonable times any premises, building or place to investigate the existence of animal diseases or to investigate violations of or otherwise enforce the laws relating to animal health. Any animals or materials suspected of being infected may be examined or tested. No person shall obstruct or interfere with such investigation or enforcement work, or attempt to do so, in any manner, by threat or otherwise.

95.23(2)

(2) Upon request of an authorized inspector or agent of the department,sheriffs and police officers shall assist in the enforcement of the laws relating to animal health.

95.99 Penalties.

95.99(1)

(1) Any person who violates this chapter, or an order issued or a rule adopted under this chapter, for which a specific penalty is not prescribed shall, for the first offense, be fined not more than $1,000; and for any subsequent offense fined not less than $500 nor more than $1,000, or imprisoned not more than 6 months or both.

95.99(2)

(2) The department may seek an injunction restraining any person from violating this chapter or any rule promulgated under this chapter.

95.99(3)

(3) A person who violates this chapter or any rule promulgated or order issued under this chapter, for which a specific penalty is not prescribed,may be required to forfeit not less than $200 nor more than $5,000 for the first offense and may be required to forfeit not less than $400 nor more than $5,000 for the 2nd or subsequent offense committed within 5 years of an offense for which a penalty has been assessed under this section. A forfeiture under this subsection is in lieu of a criminal penalty undersub.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Q: Do citizens have the right to demand a full disclosure of the exact laws and basis under which USDA and Wisconsin have charged them? Is there any defense against these attacks?

A:There seems to be none. In the cooperative agreement it states all applicable federal laws shall apply. There are certain major State and Federal Constitutional issues that these laws are in conflict with.

Q: Who exactly is asking for this information?

A:The Department of Agriculture, State of Wisconsin administered by Assistant State Veterinarian, Dr. Paul McGraw; both knowing this has nothing to do with livestock or food safety. This comes from The World Trade Organization and their trade program OIE.http://www.oie.int/eng/en_index.htm World Organization Animal Health.

Q: Where is the information stored? For what purpose?

A: Initially intake is at state level, and then it moves through forms records management plan. There are different steps on how they process this information. From everything I read, a disease outbreak would give state, federal and international interest’s access.

Q: Who is storing the information?

A:Wisconsin Department of Agriculture and then to Wisconsin Livestock Identification Consortium with (WLIC) as final repository in Canada. The WLIC is comprised of various agriculture groups, breed associations and companies selling RFID tags.

Rep. Obey & Sen. Kohl helped to get WLIC started and moved the data base to Canada. The head of WLIC initially was Gary Tauchen who is now a Wisconsin representative and sitting on the house AG committee.

In my own case, I have been registered twice after the fire number on my property changed. Once under the original number and my name and again under the newly assigned number and my farm name; I did not register for Premises ID on either occasion and was signed up without my knowledge or consent.

Q: If the WLIC is listed as the last repository of data mined information, how did files on Wisconsin agricultural properties end up being stored in Canada?

A:WLIC with the help of Rep. Obey and Sen. Kohl although I don’t know for sure how this was accomplished. The intention was to avoid any Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request or open information requests until they passed the 2008 Farm Bill and included a provision in that bill saying that these files would not be available to FOIA requests.

Q. Who had access to these files when they were outside the country?

A: We don’t know. Once it was outside US jurisdiction we had no way of knowing.

Q: Are you able to get copies of your personal file from the Canadian data bank?

A: I was able to obtain the premises information pursuant to the forms records management plan. To my knowledge I am only the second person to do so.

Q: We know these programs have nothing to do with tracking animal disease and are actually meant to end competition for industrialized agricultural interests, and to seize control of agricultural lands and livestock….who are the actual players that will benefit from these programs?

A:The big corporate industrialized agriculture operators….Cargill, Tyson, Monsanto and others, because they would see the end to competition and obtain virtually full control over all agriculture.

Q: Are Wisconsin politicians either state or federal willing to speak to you about NAIS, Premises ID or the fake food safety bills?

A:On the Federal level, Sen. Kohl and Rep. Obey will not take my calls.

(*Writer’s note: I made my own calls to these offices and when I stated what I was calling in reference to, the staffers got really nasty and then hung up)

In fact Sen. Kohl’s staffer, Kim Cates’ husband is on the Agriculture Consumer Protection Citizen board. He would not even meet with John Kinsman of Family Farm Defenders to discuss the issue.

On the state level are the continuous lies. These people will say Premises ID has nothing to do with NAIS. They say this even though they have been shown the cooperative agreement between USDA and Wisconsin DATCP outlining Premises ID as the first step. They refuse to look at or acknowledge the legal documents.

DATCP had a document on the Wisconsin Legislative information Bureau site saying that the Amish don’t have any problem with this. If the Amish don’t have a problem with it why are they suing Emmanuel Miller Jr., an Amish from Clark County?

Steve Kagen would not address our concerns and he’s on the US house Ag sub- committee that held a hearing on NAIS and is also involved in the food safety bills and won’t address our concerns even there. He is working right now to get funding to move Wisconsin into phase II of NAIS which is the mandatory chipping and tagging of all animals.

I will say that Sen. Feingold has been willing to listen to our concerns both in his Washington office and in the state office.

montages  photobucketAlthough there is a bill in Wisconsin which would restore voluntary participation I feel it is nothing more than an attempt at political redemption by the same people who passed the mandatory bill to begin with, in that they are fully aware that this bills will be sent to the House Ag committee and never see the light of day. This is merely political posturing…. The house, senate and government are all controlled by Democrats. This may be nothing more than a smoke screen while they make mandatory phase II which is the tagging and chipping, which can’t be done unless you have a Premises ID.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Paul Griepentrog shows that, in the end, what was billed and sold to Wisconsin farmers and herders as a strictly “voluntary” system turns out to be a mandatory system operated much like a police state enforcement policy. There can be no doubt, especially in light of the hyped up investigation and enforcement policies that this law in Wisconsin is less about disease and more about property seizure and forfeiture.

Wisconsin is the blueprint for the remaining states: what happens there is going to happen to all independent ranchers, farmers and producers across the country if any of these fake food safety bills, or National Animal Identification System (NAIS) is passed into law.

© 2009MartiOakley

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NAIS Is A Threat To Small Sustainable Farms and Ranches

From the Underground Food Movement-
Written by: Maria Minno



Sustainable farms, healthy foods, local foods

NAIS Is A Threat To Small Sustainable Farms and Ranches

NAIS is the National Animal Identification, a government system to track animals by injecting them with a computer chip that is read and reported on by the farmer whenever an animal changes places. It will require small farmers to spend a great deal of money on equipment and inserting the chips and reporting any changes, with terrible fines for computer errors, acts of nature, or non-compliance. Large feedlots are virtually exempted from the process, as they need only one chip number for hundreds of animals.

NAIS is a very important issue to me, as well as to small farmers, who produce our healthiest foods in a sustainable manner. It will not help with food safety, however.

The USDA will be in charge of NAIS, and the government is pushing it, because they are being heavily lobbied by the companies who will make millions off of the tags, reading equipment, and data management. It makes it look like they are doing something to promote food safety, yet NAIS is the antithesis of food safety.

The National Animal Identification System is truly frightening to me. Clearly, the modern American food system is not keeping us safe. Yet NAIS is more dangerous than the status quo. It is Orwellian, it threatens small farms, it runs against my beliefs, and is a threat to my basic needs.

It’s not that we do not need vast improvements in food safety to clear up our health crisis and food contamination dangers. We do! But corporate agribusiness pressure is preventing Congress and the USDA from enacting and enforcing true animal health and food safety measures. NAIS is not an animal health or food safety measure.

The USDA has been hearing overwhelming opposition to this measure, from both consumers and farmers. I will add my voice to the choir. I am a nutritional therapy practitioner, and I represent myself, my family, and my clients who rely upon high quality foods from small farms to regain and maintain their health. We all say that NAIS is not the animal health or food safety solution this country needs.

I am suffering from mercury poisoning caused by having a lot of silver fillings, which were removed with no consideration for the toxicity of mercury, and by consuming a lot of catfish that were contaminated with mercury and DDT. In order to survive and get well, I need to eat a lot of the highest quality milk, meat, eggs, and other animal foods. I am very careful about what I purchase, because I feel the quality of my food immediately in my day-to-day well-being. Most of the foods I buy are from small local farmers.

Because of my personal experience, I have changed the way I feed my family. My family members and my grandchildren all eat high quality animal foods from local farms, and I can really see the difference in their health and well being, especially compared to other families we know. My husband recovered from osteopoenia within a year of changing our diet to locally purchased meat and milk, and my son also became much healthier. Local animal foods have saved my life during my difficult struggles with chronic mercury toxicity.

I serve a number of clients who also have serious chronic health problems. Like me, they have found that proper nutrition is much more effective than drugs and medical procedures in improving their health and well-being. These people also rely upon animal foods from small local farms to keep them alive and healthy. If NAIS is implemented, I believe we will have NO MORE local small farms to purchase high quality products from. This is a huge quality of life issue for many people, and may even be a life-and-death issue for me, personally.

Corporate industrial farms may want to use NAIS to improve their overseas sales, and I have no objection to them tagging their own animals. Let them. However, because the tags are known to cause cancer, I wouldn’t want to eat the meat they produce, and I don’t think people from other countries will, either, once they know the tags cause cancer. And NAIS is clearly not the answer to animal health or food safety for food we want to consume in our own country.

I have a friend who did a lot of health care work at the VA hospital in Gainesville. She said that the identification tags the veterans had embedded in their necks, which are very similar to the NAIS tags, caused terrible cancers. Research shows that these tags used on pets are causing cancer, also. I do not want to eat food that has been injected with cancer causing tags. Do you?

The REAL sources of food safety problems are huge confined animal feeding operations (CAFOs) that concentrate thousands of animals in one location, as well as unsafe practices at the slaughterhouse and in food processing. NAIS traceability ends at the slaughterhouse, so what’s the point?

NAIS requires small farmers and ranchers to track each animal individually, while allowing CAFOs to track all animals under one blanket Group Identification Number. So it will be infinitely easier for the huge and dangerous CAFO’s to comply with NAIS, and impossible for the small farmers and ranchers. Thus, the USDA is promoting factory farms whose practices encourage disease, while putting small farms out of business and destroying the local food movement with their tag requirements and fees. Whose USDA is this, anyway?

What we actually need is small farms scattered all over, especially around urban areas, where the demand is the greatest and the distance the smallest, for energy efficiency and food security. The huge centralized CAFOs clearly are not good for people, for the environment, for animals, or for food safety. They are not even good for the economy, because, like WalMart, they replace the local small businesses (farms) with low-income low-quality slave labor types of jobs.

We need diversified farms, which are more sustainable, healthy, efficient, productive, and safe. If a local farm grows both animals and plants, their ecology supports one another (fertilizer for the plants, food and bugs for the animals). Small, sustainable farms are a pleasure to live near; CAFO’s are a blight.

We need to improve the viability of our own farming sector by making imports more costly, by increasing inspections of imported animals and agricultural products, and barring the entry of animals from countries with known disease problems.

We need to support our small farms, not try to put them out of business with laws and regulations such as NAIS. Read Joel Salatin’s book, “Everything I Want To Do Is Illegal” if you want to hear a funny but true story of the difficulties of producing really high quality food in this country.

We particularly need to improve enforcement of existing laws and inspections of large slaughterhouses and food processing facilities, including unannounced spot inspections. I heard an interesting story about the USDA slaughterhouse near Gainesville. Apparently they were stealing and switching meat, so that high quality grassfed meat that my friend was selling would be replaced at the slaughterhouse by conventional, low quality meat. My friend tried to talk with the slaughterhouse management, but the unethical practice continued. When my friend asked the USDA to intervene, they said that wasn’t their job!

It appears that the USDA sees its job as protecting the huge industrial farms from competition from small farms that produce exceptionally high quality food that is now in high demand.

Where NAIS has been tried already, it has been found to be a resounding failure for all of its stated goals. NAIS is government control and ineptitude magnified a million-fold. Furthermore, it is reminiscent of the practices of Nazi Germany. NAIS may make a few large corporations wealthy (like the tag and reader manufacturers and database managers), but for all the rest of us, it has no redeeming value, and an unacceptable cost.

Please stop this travesty now.

To sign a petition against HR 2749
http://www.ftcldf.org/petitions/pnum993.php

To sign a petition against NAIS
http://www.ftcldf.org/petitions_new.htm

To submit comments regarding NAIS to the USDA
http://animalid.aphis.usda.gov/nais/feedback

For more information on NAIS and HR 2749
http://www.nonais.org/
http://www.ftcldf.org/press/press-08july2009.htm
http://www.ftcldf.org/news/news-02june2009-5.htm

Gainesville Sun editorial on HR 2749
http://www.gainesville.com/article/20090714/NEWS/907149927/1008/WEATHER?Title=Maria-Minno-This-bill-is-a-threat-to-small-farms

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NAIS – Interview with Linda Faillace

National Animal Identification System (NAIS)

Written by: Bill Suydam, Editor, Health Spectator

An interview with Linda Faillace, author of Mad Sheep

The National Animal Identification System is another of those government ideas that sounds so right on the surface but goes so wrong in the implementation details. Basically, it is a nationwide registration system for animals and the sites where they are kept. It has been causing a major uproar within the farming community, as it is a burden to small farmers, among others.

It will affect you too if you keep any sort of farm animals such as chickens, sheep, goats, horses, etc.—but if you do, you undoubtedly already know this.

We’ve been preparing a piece on this subject, but in the process we came across this video that gives you an excellent summary of what’s involved. So we thought we’d provide a video introduction, then look to converting our investigative reporting to a background article or editorial.

Most of our readers have probably never heard of NAIS. If you fall into that category, the video below will be a real eye-opener. The presenter is Linda Faillace, author of Mad Sheep:The True Story Behind the USDA’s War on a Family Farm, who knows a thing or two about dealing with the USDA as a small farmer.

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