01/24/`06 Security and animal ID

Washington Ag January 24, 2006 The recent audio tape of Osama Bin Laden was mentioned by a USDA official at an animal ID seminar at the Pacific Northwest Farm Forum in Spokane as a reason the U.S. needs a national animal identification system. Terrorists could introduce a disease into the nation's cattle herd which needs to be tracked down quickly. Rancher Len McIrvin also raised the topic of terrorists but his concern was that an ID system based on electronic ear tags could too easily be tampered with by a terrorist or just an unfriendly neighbor. McIrvin says what the system really tracks is tags not cattle. McIrvin: "I could have my tag in any person's cow in this room by this time tomorrow simply with a catch rope, tagger, and set of side-cutters." Scott Holt of Allflex, an electronic ear tag maker, said new tags can't be tampered with but McIrvin challenged that. McIrvin: "If we have people who can learn to fly an airplane into the Twin Towers I am sure there is technology to figure out how to cut an ear off one cow and get that tag inserted into another cow." USDA veterinarian Doctor David Morris told that seminar USDA has no timelines currently for when animal ID would become mandatory. I'm Bob Hoff.