Tiffany Fuhr -- -- Rookie Of The Year

Minnesota DHIA recently recognized Field Representative, Tiffany Fuhr for her exceptional performance by being named the "Rookie of TheYear" for 2003.

Tiffany Fuhr from Redwood Falls, has been a Field Representative for Minnesota DHIA since April, 2003 in Redwood, Renville and Yellow Medicine Counties. Currently Tiffany makes visits to 22 herds each month. Tiffany also has lent a hand in other areas of DHIA. She has attended trade shows to promote DHIA services and also has been involved in a Dairy Comp 305 software online training class sponsored by the University of Minnesota.

In her spare time, Tiffany enjoys raising and showing her horses. Thank you Tiffany for providing excellent service to our customers.

Pat Clark Reaches Milestone
Our sincere congratulations go out to our hard working and dedicated Minnesota DHIA Field Representative, Pat Clark of Austin, who is celebrating her 25^th anniversary with DHIA this month. Please join us in extending our thanks to her for all the good work she does.

For Sale
To list Cows, Heifers, or Hay for Sale call Nancy Zander at 800-827-3442.

% Cull Rate : - This statistic can be found on the "Consultant Summary" side of the Herd Summary on tan paper. It is the number of animals that left the herd in the past 365 days divided by the number of animals in the herd, plus the number of animals that left the herd. It tells you the number of animals you have had in your herd in the last 365 days to achieve current herd size.

 ID – it’s gonna be big!

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) on the National Animal Identification System

USDA has accepted The U.S. Animal Identification Plan (USAIP) to define the standards and framework for implementing and maintaining a phased-in national animal identification system for the United States. USDA has changed the name to the National Animal Identification System (NAIS).

A national animal identification system is needed to help protect American animal agriculture. This national plan, which identifies all food animals and livestock, will enhance disease preparedness by allowing the U.S. to identify any animals exposed to disease and will facilitate stopping the spread of that disease. In addition, it will provide benefits to industry in terms of market access and consumer demand. The NAIS will uphold the U.S.’s reputation for having a safe food supply and will promote continued confidence in agricultural or livestock products. Having a working system that allows for traceback and trace forward to all premises that had direct contact with an animal with a foreign animal disease within 48 hours of discovery will reduce the financial and social impacts of such a disease.

The adoption of a national identification system will help secure the health of the national herd. The program will provide producers and animal health officials with the infrastructure to improve efforts in current disease eradication and control, protect against foreign animal disease outbreaks and provide infrastructure to address threats from deliberate introduction of disease.

The plan for the program is currently being developed. Initial start-up costs will be different than the costs of a fully operational system in all 50 states. It is anticipated that the federal government and all industry stakeholders will share in the costs of an identification system.

The administration and maintenance of premises ID lies with each state’s department of Agriculture. State departments will use a national mechanism to obtain a unique national premises ID, and will record additional information such as type of premises, contact name, address, and phone number to contact the person in charge of a premises. Key pieces of information will be sent to the national premises database that can be used in the case of a disease trace-back.

The form of animal identification used is intended to optimize accuracy, promote efficient information transfer, and be practical and effective in its application for individual species and/or industries. Species groups will have the choice of designing a system that may or may not use accompanying visible ID. For example, the cattle industry plans to use radio frequency identification (RFID) technology using an eartag attachment. Other species are exploring methods suitable for their industries, although effective official identification methods as described in the 9 Code of Federal Regulations will be maintained for certain species. Electronic identification may be necessary for efficient and accurate data collection and animal tracking in some species or in particular animal movement scenarios. Official identification tags will not replace management ear tags unless the species groups establish those options. Ultimately it is anticipated that technological advances will allow for one tag or ID device that performs multiple functions. Implants (i.e., microchips) may be permitted for certain species in which no other form of ID is suitable and assuming that the implant site has been approved by the FDA and FSIS relative to ease of discovery at slaughter when appropriate.

It is expected that tags will be available from a number of sources, including DHIA.

Producers are responsible for identifying animals. The livestock will need to be identified before they leave whatever premises they are on regardless of where they were born. Ultimately, identifying animals will be the responsibility of the "premises of birth" producers.

It is anticipated that the final plan will be user-friendly such that it will be easy for all stakeholders to implement and make part of their daily practice. Ideally animal movements will be electronically tracked and sent from the stakeholders to the central database. For the plan to be successful, this key part, i.e. data entry, will need to be easy to follow, thus achievable in real-time such that data entry becomes a routine management practice.

Only state and federal health officials will have access to the premises and animal ID information when performing their duties to maintain the health of the national herd. Proper safeguards are being researched and are expected to be put in place to ensure that the data is protected from public disclosure.

Currently, the species include beef, dairy, swine, and sheep. It is anticipated that equine, aquaculture, poultry, goats, camelids, cervids and any other species deemed necessary to protect animal agriculture will be included in the future.

Efforts are geared toward developing a national animal identification program that will provide for the ability to rapidly track animals exposed to a disease concern, and will meet the needs of producers, animal industries, domestic and international markets and consumers. The plan still needs to be completed and the system needs to be tested to be sure it is effective and workable. Incremental implementation of the plan as development continues will allow for potential problems within the system to be identified and the plan modified to address those problems. Ultimately there needs to be full compliance for the system to work as effectively as it should. Once the USAIP has been finalized, considered workable and accepted by industry, it is likely that industry and market forces will drive the process towards full compliance. At that time, USDA will work with industry and state partners to achieve full participation with the NAIS.

Producers are, and have always been responsible for the livestock they produce. If practices are employed that would endanger consumers at any level the producer responsible for creating that threat could have increased liability. Merely having the animals Identified through the NAIS will neither increase nor decrease that liability.

Several steps need to be completed before the NAIS could be fully implemented, however the USAIP recommends that:

• All states have a premises identification system initiated by Fall, 2004;
• Unique, individual or group/lot numbers be available for issuance by the end of 2004;
• Early implementation projects are being screened for funding by USDA in July 2004. The scope and success of these projects will help determine the pace at which implementation may proceed.
• All cattle, swine, and small ruminants are expected to possess individual or group/lot identification for interstate movement by July 2005;
• All animals of the remaining species/industries identified above be in similar compliance by July 2006.