US. M'ID system may go to the Expensive Austrailian Deal

[PORKER]

NLIS chief tight-lipped on US licensing deal

Friday, 28/10/2005

Australia is closer to signing a licensing deal with the United States to use our National Livestock Identification System (NLIS).

It is a lucrative market because about 26 million cattle are slaughtered there each year.

Rick Beasley, the head of NLIS at Meat and Livestock Australia, will not confirm how close Australia is to securing a deal.

"We had approaches from quite a number of countries recently to look at whether the core system here can be licensed, improved, modified, whatever, to suit their requirements," he said.

"Obviously their requirements are obviously going to be a lot different to ours.

"But the basics of traceablility remain the same around the world.

"You want to know where the animal's born, where it's lived through its lifetime, what risk status it has and when it's ultimately slaughtered - the core system is the same around the world."

 

[PORKER]

Traceability in the U.S. will be vital to
maintain and grow export markets.
Australia's reliance on exports has led
to strong and continuing support of
a national ID system, says Rick Beasley,
operations manager of Meat and
Livestock Australia's National Livestock
Identification System. "We
have been fortunate that we have
had good buy-in from all sectors of
industry from the start," he says.
"We all know that loss of markets
would spell disaster to all sectors of
the industry."
Global Animal
Management Inc. found that consumers,
who already perceive the
nation's meat supply as safe, would
be even more confident with the
implementation of the NAIS.

The benefits beyond disease control
are extensive, including everything
from verification of age, source,
process and breed to enhanced management
tools and broad vertical
data-sharing models.
Australian producers, who have
been phasing in a national animal-ID
system since 1999, now use sophisticated
on-farm software to collect
data to enhance on-property management,
(But local farmers say its expensive)
Beasley says. "In addition,
carcass-feedback information can be
provided by packers in electronic
form and matched to the same electronic
number on an individual-body
basis. This then provides a very powerful
herd-management package."
strengthen their animal-ID systems,an
traceability in the U.S. will be vital to
maintain and grow export markets.
Australia's reliance on exports has led
to strong and continuing support of
a national ID system, says Rick Beasley,
operations manager of Meat and
Livestock Australia's National Livestock
Identification System.