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Deadline to comply with traceability rule nears
Cattle producers have until November 5 to switch to tags that comply with the USDA’s final traceability rule.
National Cattlemen’s Beef Association’s vice president of government affairs, Ethan Lane, says visually and electronically readable tags are required for intact breeding animals over 18 months, moving interstate along with rodeo cattle and bison. “We’re hearing from sale barns, others, and breeders,” he says. “The reality of this is this is a very minor change that it basically just updates the hardware being used to satisfy this requirement.”
He tells Brownfield an animal disease outbreak could happen at any time in the U.S., and the industry needs to be prepared. Lane says this is an insurance policy for cattle producers. “When that happens, the most important thing for producers to resume commerce is going to be the ability to demonstrate that their animals have not come in contact with animals that have whatever the pathogen is, whatever the zoonotic disease is that’s out there,” he says.
Lane says producer information is safe. “The data is going to reside with your state animal health officials, who we feel a lot more comfortable with than USDA,” he says. “USDA will be able to access that information only in the event of a disease outbreak. They don’t have free license to just goof around with that data and put it into spreadsheets and use it for other purposes.”
He says the USDA has taken orders from every state animal health official in the country for EID tags, and money appropriated last year ensures that producers have access to the tags free of charge to comply with the obligation.
Lane says 8 million tags have been distributed to state animal health officials.
AUDIO: Ethan Lane, NCBA
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