Posted on 01/18/2008 11:41:34 AM PST by BGHater
A federal database of animals to fight disease outbreaks is a threat to privacy and family operations, critics say.
WASHINGTON — After days of parading around her beefy black steer in the dung-scented August heat at the Colorado State Fair, Brandi Calderwood made the final competition. For months, the 16-year-old worked from dawn well past dusk, fitting in the work around school, to feed, train and clean her steer. But just before the last round, when the animals are sold, fair officials disqualified her.
They alleged that Brandi had not properly followed a new and controversial rule that required children to register their farms with a federal animal tracking system. After heated words, the Calderwoods were told to leave. A security guard trailed Brandi and her mother, even to the restroom.
"Emotionally she went through the wringer and didn't get the honor of showing in the sale. For a 16-year-old, that's a big deal," said Cathy Calderwood, Brandi's mother.
A Bush administration initiative, the National Animal Identification System is meant to provide a modern tool for tracking disease outbreaks within 48 hours, whether natural or the work of a bioterrorist. Most farm animals, even exotic ones such as llamas, will eventually be registered. Information will be kept on every farm, ranch or stable. And databases will record every animal movement from birth to slaughterhouse, including trips to the vet and county fairs.
But the system is spawning a grass-roots revolt.
Family farmers see it as an assault on their way of life by a federal bureaucracy with close ties to industrial agriculture. They point out that they will have to track every animal while vast commercial operations will be allowed to track whole herds.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
CONTEST: Brandi Calderwood and her steer were disqualified at the Colorado State Fair because she had not registered in the ID program. “It’s just way too much Big Brother,” her mother said. 
TAGGED: The 15-digit code identifies the calf and helps keep track of its activities.
NAIS ping
When they came for the cattle I said nothing, because I wasn’t a cow...
;^)
Just another method of getting people out of the country and back into the big city where they can be tracked. Country people are too independent for the government. Government wants everyone accounted for wants them to rely on them. Bill Clinton took millions of privately owned land and made it federal, pushing people into the city.
1) Participation in the National Animal Identification System is voluntary.
2) The registration requirement was imposed by the local fair board, not the USDA. The young lady failed to follow a rule and she was disqualified. ( in animal shows, particularly animal shows whose participation is supposed to be limited to youngsters, being able to trace the provenance of a show animal is legitimate )
3) Having said this, I think the program is horrible and is clearly detrimental to the interests of small farmers (so are farm subsidies, but this girl's folks probably don't whine about them)
Perhaps about when she raised cattle as a child?
It all for your “safety.”
Sadly, 51% now think “safety” trumps liberty.
I wouldn’t care about them, except they are rushing to toss my liberty overboard too.
Your comment has a better note of falsehood, though; that's probably very like what she'd say.
;^)
When constructing a nuclear power plant, every single welding rod is accounted for from cradle to final weld. By being able to trace all the materials, you have a much better ability to diagnose potential or actual failures.
Likewise, it’s good to be able to trace how, when and from what origin prions entered our food chain. Following the rules can’t be hard and makes tremendous sense given the potential damages to our health and the economy if BSE gets out of control.
There’s a good side and a bad side to this. And for those who think ID’ing an animal is invasive, let me assure you that you cannot imagine how authoritarian the USDA can be when push comes to shove.
That is, routinely, the USDA puts entire States off-limits to even growing some produce or animals *at all*, because of some disease, usually. Nobody in my entire State was *permitted* to grow wheat for 5 years, in one such instance, because of a disease called “karnal bunt”.
When Hoof and Mouth disease hits a single animal in a herd, they will kill the entire herd, and there is nothing the farmer can do about it. The USDA even does this in northern Mexico, *near* our border. And yes, they do pay the farmer for his losses, but he has no, zero choice. And once they kill the herd, they will burn the cadavers, to insure that the farmer doesn’t sell the skins for leather.
The problem, here, is not the ID program, it is how it is executed. Properly, it should have been carried out not by federal and State bureaucrats, but by veterinarians. By adding a single layer to the program, most of the annoyance to individual farmers would have vanished.
Animal shows and the like have to have vets check the animals anyway, to insure a diseased animal is not entered into the system. Once small farmers understood the concept, compliance would be a lot easier. Just every time their vet came around to check their livestock, they would register any new ones.
The benefits even to small farmers are far greater than the annoyance. If there is some nasty disease going around the animals in a State, they don’t want to buy a sick one, or worse, harvest it for food. And if they sell one of their animals meat to the market, and somebody gets sick from it, it is better that they lose all their animals rather than continue to put sick ones up for sale.
And yes, the government will reimburse them for their loss.
You know the same thing was said about Social Security and Income Taxes when those came around. "Voluntary" government crap doesn't stay "voluntary" for very long after creation. The "voluntary" period is the soft opening.
Your post and your screenname are oxymorons.
Give up freedom to get safety ?
Haven’t you wondered why every time one of these cases come up, we ALREADY know the origination of the cow ? Hint: it’s not because of NAIS. It’s because it’s the big factory farms and ranches that are primarily at risk.
The small organic farms have never had a problem and because they use organic methods they will not be at risk, yet you’d force them to comply with onerous regulations just because the major processors practice unsafe methods. Oh, and those same large processors get to track by herd, not by individual cow as the smaller farms do. It puts lots more cost on the small operations with little increase in cost on the big ones.
It’s good to know what you advocate - it might not be quite what you think.
And yes, the government will reimburse them for their loss with tax money extorted from other people.
There. It's complete and correct now.
Dear Farmers: Quite voting ddemocrat = problem solved.
So far.
ping
Whatever the benefits of NAIS, the federal government has no legitimate authority to regulate the raising of animals, especially those not intended for interstate commerce.
One problem with your post. You are wrong about the cost to small operations.
Case in point - I have 10 chickens. One dies - under NAIS I have to report it, get a vet to check the cause etc etc, even tho these chickens never leave my property and only provide food (eggs) for my family. What goes from no cost to me goes to major headache.
Second case in point. I have 3 horses. I decide to hack out one afternoon. I cross 23 properties on one particular jaunt. I have to register every trip and report every location every single time I do this. 3 horses, several hacks a week - tell, me, who at the FDA can possibly keep up with this nonsense ?
Last year there was an outbreak of the equine encephalis virus in MD, VA and FL. The vets coordinated getting information out to all the show venues and setting guidelines in case any infected animal showed up at any show grounds. There was no government involvement - just a completely voluntary private cooperation among all parties to keep all horses safe from infection.
Multiply me by the thousands and thousands of private animal owners and you begin to get a clue. People comply with these types of voluntary private efforts because no one wants to lose their animals to avoidable diseases.
Let the free market work and get NAIS out of our barns.
A small farm in Vermont thought that, too. Until there whole herd of sheep developed scrappy, and was ordered destroyed to keep it from infecting other sheep.
Scrappy is the sheep version of Mad Cow Disease. Prions, which are folded proteins, cause that disease and not destructible. No one has yet figured out how to destroy the things. Autoclaves can destroy bacteria and viruses, but folded proteins, once in the environment, seem to be immortal.
This is very serious and claiming that you’re organic just doesn’t matter any more.
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