The National Animal Identification System is supposed to be a quick way to trace livestock from birth to the grocery story. Linda Cope with the Idaho State Department of Agriculture says the trace back system is supposed to be up and running by January 2009.
COPE "In Idaho we're one of the top states in registration. We have 16 thousand registered. That happened by us taking a data base that was already public record and we imported that into the system."
Soda Springs rancher Mark Harris signed up and put his cattle herd into the Northwest Pilot Project data base.
HARRIS "The process of getting a premises i-d is pretty easy. All you do is call the ISDA office. You just tell them what your brand is and they issue you a number."
Animal identification involves two dollar tags, a scanning system and software, moderate costs for Harris for something so important.
HARRIS "It's a good opportunity. I really don't see any negatives of it."
Harris says he manages his herd, keeps the government out of his business but if there's an emergency he'll take the inconvenience knowing that he can account for his animals' records.
Voice of Idaho Agriculture
Bill Scott
