By Alexis Hunt
Posted: Thursday, December 06, 2007 at 5:50 p.m.
The U-S Department of Agriculture wants to pass a law that'll affect farmers in the Tri-States as well as across the country. The U-S-D-A has designed a National Animal Identification System or N-A-I-S. This system requires all livestock get registered by placing a plastic tag in their ear. That tag has an electronic number that gets scanned through a computer when the animal goes through a livestock auction. The U-S-D-A says this process is for disease traceback, but members of R-Calf and the Missouri Farmer's Union beg to differ. They met today to discuss these issues.
"We're not against the technology at all...the reason we're against this is the government is intending to make this mandatory. Also there's a significant cost...and there's no program to assist us in that cost," said President of R-Calf Max Thornsberry.
The law won't take effect until 2010. When it takes affect, it will be a federal offense to remove the id.
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thanks for helping to make people aware of NAIS...even though currently claimed as voluntary, efforts of the USDA paid for by over 100 million dollars of your tax money are pushing it to be mandatory. And there is huge resistance by the people of this stupid program. Over 90% are against NAIS yet the USDA continues to ram this program down our throats.
NAIS is touted as a disease tracking program but in reality is a corporate agriculture business plan (microchip companies are in the ground floor of planning NAIS also) that will require every last person who owns one or more livestock animal (even as a pet) to follow these 4 components that will severely impact their constitutional and personal freedoms......
1. register their premises with the govt. (currently only convicted sex offenders have to register where they live with the govt. Also signing up may put title to property in jeopardy)
2. microchip ALL their critters (cost will not be cheap and cancer is a concern with any microchip)
3. file birth, death and off property movement reports on those animals within 24 hrs or face huge fines.
4. face depopulation (killing) of all animals in a 6 mi. radius (140 sq. miles) should a disease of concern be suspected. (In the NAIS document, ringworm is listed as a disease of concern.!!!)
Look at what happened in England, with foot and mouth disease...millions of healthy cattle killed, barns burned, private property confiscated for a preventable, vaccinatable disease that is really more a nuisance than deadly. Huge piles of dead animals were left to rot in the open. Over 80 farmers committed suicide and they found the disease had escaped from the local research lab!!!!!)
The REAL REASON for NAIS is so big ag can sell on the global market, but they do not have to tag and track every animal, they get just one lot number per groups of animals. Any one of those animals could be sick and who woild know.
This program will make it appear to foreign buyers that the USA has a good disease tracking program that makes it look like the meat they are buying is safe. But how does my telling the govt everywhere I ride my horse keep bird flu ( or mad cow disease) from the factory farmed animals? The funny thing is that there are very good disease tracking programs already in place and they work! American meat is already the safest in the world. Why do they want to tag and track every last chicken or pet pot belly pig? Crazy, isn’t it?
When the USDA was trying to get animal owners to sign up for NAIS, they were told NAIS is needed to stop the spread of mad cow disease. But when Creekstone Beef wanted to test every cow they process for BSE, the USDA says they could not!!! They claimed it would cost too much money and that everyone else would have to do it too.
There are already mistakes being made in protecting our food. The so-called salmonella infected tomatoes in the summer of 2008prompted many farmers to plow under thousands of acres of tomatoes. But further investigation has shown it was really infected peppers from Mexico. Oops! What if that had been NAIS and healthy animals killed before it was found there were infected animals elsewhere?
One should take NAIS as serious as a rattlesnake with rabies sitting in the middle of your living room (even though the USDA tries to tell us it is just an innocent little puppy) The USDA is NOT listening to those of us who do not want any part of it. After all, NAIS was made to benefit corporate ag so they could sell their meat products on a global level but put all the work/costs of tagging/tracking individual animals of private livestock owners on their own property with none of the benefits nor profits.
The only problem with this program is that e-coli happens after the cow is slaughtered, which is when NAIS tracking stops. The beef is most vulnerable to being tainted in those processing plants. And the fact the beef/pork/chicken raised by corporate agriculture who will not be required to tag and track each animal. Because they raise them in lots, they they get only ONE number per groups of animals. Any one of those critters in that group could be diseased and who would know. But as long as there are appearances of something being done, the city dwellers will eat in peace, while granny and her few egg hens will be tracked closer than the illegals, drug dealers or sex offenders.
In a nutshell, NAIS is like a world traveler having a disease but forcing me to take/pay for the meds, then he goes a declares he is cured, and continues to travel the world. Makes absolutely no sense, benefits neither one of us, but that is how NAIS will work. NAIS will affect everyone who eats, and not in a good way.
See nonais.org for more info on this ridiculous program that will affect everyone who eats.
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