Cattle Identification: NAIS - The Benefits Of A Voluntary Program

Participation in NAIS is voluntary at the Federal level. There are no Federal penalties or enforcement mechanisms associated with the program. USDA believes that measures of this nature are simply unnecessary. NAIS brings a range of positive benefits to producers, and these advantages offer strong reasons for voluntary participation. Signing up for the first component of NAIS—premises registration—is a quick and easy process, and Federal law protects individuals’ private and confidential business information from disclosure.

Part I: Overview of NAIS 7

Everyone who lives off of the land understands how important it is to protect the health of the animals, plants, and humans who share it. Producers also know that we must promote both domestic and foreign markets and remain competitive in trade. They also recognize our added responsibility to be vigilant against any attempt to tamper with our food supply. NAIS helps producers achieve all of these goals. For producers and others in the animal agriculture sector, NAIS will ensure that—in the case of a disease event— everyone can benefit from rapid response.

In a market-driven economy, the ability to locate and rapidly respond to a disease situation is key to protecting access to both domestic and international markets. A single report of disease can shut down consumer demand for U.S. products. With NAIS, animal health officials will be able to use premises information to quickly define which regions of our country are, and are not, affected by an outbreak—keeping markets open for unaffected producers and preventing unnecessary movement restrictions. Prices at home are dictated by the overall demand for U.S. products. Therefore, to maintain and protect prices for domestic commodities, it is crucial for international markets to stay open.

Rapid disease response reduces the number of producers impacted by an outbreak. This, in turn, reduces the hardships associated with an outbreak—the loss of irreplaceable breeding stock and bloodlines, the animal distress and loss resulting from the disease itself and the eradication effort, as well as the labor and time involved with this work. By facilitating rapid disease response, NAIS also helps to protect the larger community from the impact of a disease situation. Rapid disease response reduces the strain on social programs, the environmental impact, and the loss of jobs and tourism in affected communities.

Market demands—such as product and source verification, etc.—are increasing in importance and are another important reason for producers to participate in NAIS. A number of other countries are already using animal identification to give their exports a competitive edge. NAIS allows American producers to share that advantage. The greater the level of participation in NAIS, the greater the potential to expand marketing opportunities—which is of merit to the entire industry.

In this regard, USDA believes participation in the main components of NAIS can occur as a result of standard business practices. For example, in order for producers to obtain official identification devices, they first need to register for a premises identification number. Accordingly, the success of the premises registration component would be achieved through the participation of producers in longstanding disease management programs and compliance with interstate movement regulations.

Every producer can find good reason to participate in NAIS. Premises registration is a valuable tool for producers and is independent of the other NAIS components. Signing up for premises registration in no way obligates a producer to participate in the other parts of the program. Producers can register their premises today and decide later whether to participate in the rest of the program. Whatever decision they make, NAIS will provide additional options for producers when they are ready to make decisions about what combination of tools best suits their needs.

Source: NAIS