Lessons for the U.S. Beef Industry Learned from the Australian National Livestock Identification System

The U.S. beef industry and both national and local regulatory agencies have been struggling to develop a national animal identification system (NAIS) for several years. The discovery of a single cow in the United States in December 2003 infected with BSE heightened awareness of the need for animal identification (ID) and meat traceability in the United States (and subsequent discoveries with difficult traceability furthered these concerns). However, costs, design, ownership, and control concerns associated with ani-mal traceback have made implementation a substantial challenge. Questions many indus-try participants wonder about include: What are the costs of implementation and opera-tion of an ID system? Who would collect and store animal ID information? Who would have access to such information? How would this information be used? What is the value of such a system? In the mean time, global adoption of animal and meat traceability systems is moving forward at a rapid pace, placing the U.S. beef industry at a competitive disadvantage in international markets. One animal ID system that has been in place for a relatively long period of time and is continuing to develop is the Australian system. Because the Australian system is one o