Swift pays South Dakota cattleman after two months
Tuesday, January 30, 2007, 2:41 PM
by Peter Shinn
Audio related to this story
AUDIO: Peter Shinn reports (1 1/2 min MP3).
Jan Van Dyke of Wessington Springs, South Dakota, took a load of slaughter-ready cattle to a Swift plant in Nebraska last November after feeding them out. But Swift wouldn't pay for seven head because they had Canadian ear tags, nor would the company pay for the offal from the cattle Van Dyke had delivered.
Van Dyke was out more than $11,000 and USDA began investigating how he was able to buy Canadian feeders at auction, feed them out and then sell them to Swift unwittingly. Then on Monday, more than two months after the initial incident, Swift finally paid Van Dyke. Van Dyke continues to insist the cattle he took to Swift did have what appeard to be Canadian ear tags in them.
But Rick Fox, President of the South Dakota Stockgrowers Association, told Brownfield it appears USDA must have decided that Swift somehow confused Van Dyke’s cattle with some Canadian cattle it already had at that plant.
"Apparently that must be what they're saying, because Swift is the one that paid him," Fox said. "But I know I've talked with Mr. Van Dyke and he's pretty adamant that these cattle were on his place."
But Fox hastened to add that he had no official word from USDA that their investigation into the matter is complete. And Fox said the apparent mix-up brings into question how USDA is enforcing its minimal risk rule which allows young Canadian cattle into the U.S. According to Fox, it's a big deal because USDA is now proposing to allow older Canadian cattle into America. And Fox said South Dakota cattlemen are worried about it.
"The real big concern now going on out in ranch country here now is these cull cows that are going to start coming in out of Canada," said Fox. He said a USDA economic analysis of its proposed minimal risk rule expansion suggested an influx of 610,000 older Canadian cattle in the first year after the rule takes effect.
Fox added many South Dakota cattlemen are concerned about USDA's apparent inability to track Canadian cattle after they enter the U.S., given the multiple cases of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) that have been detected in Canadian cattle. "The prion, you know, is kind of like Superman - it's indestructible," Fox said. "So if one of these prions come in here, it's here in the United States forever."
A public comment period on USDA’s proposal to allow older Canadian cattle into the United States is open right now. The fact is that there is no system to easily trace Canadian cattle once they cross the border into the United States. South Dakota State Veterinarian Dr. Sam Holland told Brownfield last week he's recommended to USDA more than once that such a tracking system be implemented. Holland said that's important not so much from the perspective of BSE, which is not high communicable, but in order to help control highly contagious animal diseases like FMD, should one inadvertently be introduced into the U.S. via a Canadian animal.