Vilsack Responds To Traceability Concerns

USDA's enhanced animal disease traceability rule, including visual and electronic identification tags for cattle and bison, is scheduled to go into effect early next month.  Some stakeholders have expressed privacy concerns, but Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack doesn’t think producers need to be worried.

“I don't think they should be concerned about the confidentiality because it's going to be controlled by the state," Vilsack said during a recent trip to Wisconsin.  "It's not going to be controlled by the federal government. That information is not going to go to the federal government. It’s going to go to the state.”

The Secretary noted the importance of animal disease traceability in the context of keeping export markets open in the event of a disease outbreak.

“When I did the G7 meeting, people were very interested in H5N1 in terms of our ability to test our ability to identify our ability to make sure that exports were being checked and protected, that they weren't getting milk that was tainted in any way," Vilsack said.  "So the ability to have that system is really, really important.”

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