Food Fight Against NAIS

Aug 1, 2008 12:00 PM, By Sandra Kay Miller

Summer — a great time to grill a few steaks or some chicken, toss up a fresh salad with tomatoes and for dessert, a nice bowl of gourmet ice cream. In the last year alone, all of those pleasures have been put at risk with a variety of disease outbreaks leading to some of the largest food recalls in the history of the country.

As the food supply has become increasingly industrialized and globalized over the last 75 years, security has been historically transparent to the consumer. Rarely does anyone consider the extensive checks and controls associated with ensuring safety when it comes to food. Similar to manufacturing and supply chains in the durable goods markets, the food industry has begun to embrace electronic technology for regulations aimed at consumer protection as government oversight demands accountability in the advent of food borne illness outbreaks.

In the digital world, the terms of virus outbreaks, infections and affected systems seem paled by the scope of real-world consequences when a highly virulent organism affects critical food systems. While the worlds of agriculture and information technology may appear poles apart, there are many similarities when it comes to security. Network engineers concern themselves with perimeter and network defenses as do farmers who practice multi-layered biosecurity. In the event of a breach or an outbreak, one loses data, the other loses plants and animals — and they both lose money.

However, farmers are bringing tools and technologies in the modern enterprise into the fields and barns in an effort to effectively identify and track animals using methods other than branding, tattooing and tagging.

Although documented evidence suggests that humans have been creating unique identifiers for their agricultural products since ancient Egypt, electronic identification (EID) systems geared toward the agricultural industry have been growing steadily for the last 10 years. Starting in the livestock sectors as a method for automating animal identification and management, EID has also extended into fresh fruits and vegetables, beverages and pharmaceuticals.

There are many challenges associated with a standardized EID system to track food products through the supply chain and ultimately, to the consumer. Currently, as many as a dozen identification systems might be in place at various stages.

In the highly regulated food processing and distribution arenas, EID systems have been put in place to enable traceability when it comes to tracking down food borne illness outbreaks, such as Escherichia coli O157:H7, Salmonella, Camphelobacter and Listeriosis — all reportable to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). However, tracking an outbreak back through the food supply chain often breaks down at the axis between producer and distribution.

To remedy this challenge, particularly in meat production due to the emergence of Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (commonly referred to as Mad Cow disease), a three-pronged approach known as the National Animal Identification System (NAIS) was created.

The first step is for individual states to assign Premises identifications and enter the information into a national database. A Premise is basically any real estate parcel where designated livestock species are housed, regardless of whether it was for production or companionship.

Once Premises were established, the second phase would be to assign unique identification numbers to individual animals located on each Premise. Currently, most government and private programs requiring animal identification, such as the Scrapie Flock Certification Program which tracks transmissible spongiform encephalopathy — a fatal, degenerative disease affecting the central nervous system of sheep and goats or individual breed registries — accept non-electronic ear tags and tattoos as a method for identification. However from the start, NAIS wanted to take full advantage of available technologies, such as RFID (both external tags and implants), retinal scanning and DNA samples to further guarantee the authentication of an individual animal.

The third component of NAIS, animal tracking, would combine Premise ID with Animal ID to monitor each time certain events occur, such as the change of an animal's ownership, location or entry into the food chain.

“We want to be able to protect producers and their operation, and protect their livestock in the event of a disease outbreak,” says Bruce Knight, USDA under secretary for marketing and regulatory programs, who also cautions that the United States is more at risk from infectious disease today compared to historical disease trends.

According to Neil Hammerschmidt, who is the coordinator for NAIS at the USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) Veterinary Services department, “Animal agriculture is an $80 billion industry. Its importance to the U.S. economy and to the producers who depend on it for their livelihood cannot be overstated.”

Agreeing with Knight, Hammerschmidt believes the risk of an animal disease outbreak in the United States is very real. Being able to quickly trace a disease back to its source is essential to limit the spread of the disease and to minimize its negative impact on the agriculture industry. It depends on having a national identification database in effect.

With such a system in place, Knight foresees an effective system that would allow veterinarians to react on the federal, state and local levels.

The voluntary program was designed to be administered at the federal level by the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, a branch of the United Stated Department of Agriculture. Individual states would have jurisdiction to implement it. But there was a catch at the state level. In order to receive USDA funds for what was turning out to be a costly program, numerous aspects of NAIS were deemed mandatory.

Similar to the Real ID Act that aimed to install specific security and authentication standards for drivers licenses issued in the United States, there was a huge backlash to NAIS from a variety of individuals and groups for as many reasons.

States, such as North Carolina and Tennessee, required farmers to comply with NAIS requisites prior to their premises receiving any agricultural relief aid during severe drought. This situation was taken as the bellwether that the government would use information in the database other than for what it was originally intended, thus angering people.

Small-scale producers feared they would be forced to bear the brunt of costly technologies and excessive paperwork to meet requirements. Recreational livestock owners felt unfairly burdened since their animals were not destined for food. Religious orders with deep roots in agriculture who eschew modern conveniences and technology (Amish, Mennonites and Hutterites) were alarmed it would not be conducive to their way of life.

Instead of creating a method that would provide a 48-hour minimum trace-back to the originating source in the event of either a food-borne illness or contagious livestock disease outbreak, the USDA was saddled with a battle over civil liberties since, in essence, the government was assigning a unique identifier and tracking what has always been considered personal property.

Further exacerbating the problem: Many of the states, especially those with significant agricultural industries such as Wisconsin, contracted the management of the Premise ID database to private interest groups associated with global agribusiness corporations, thus prompting fears of unfair competitive advantages.

But many states went ahead with enforcement, even going as far as clandestine raids to tag animals against owners' wishes. In response, the USDA and the Michigan Department of Agriculture were sued by the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund, a non-profit garnering much attention throughout the country over what they consider unfair government intervention in consumers' food choices.

In June 2008, opponents were relieved when the Office of the Secretary at the USDA issued a notice in the Federal Register indefinitely suspending the effective date for NAIS. Ironically, in the notice, the first government agency to be alerted to this change was the Department of Homeland Security.

Want to use this article? Click here for options!
© 2012 Penton Media Inc.

This month in Access Control

• Targeting The Customer
• Electronic Pedigrees
• One Hero Among Many
• Who? What? When? Where? Why?
• More from September's issue