This ability allows us to quickly determine the origin of any suspected animal disease cases, a means to identify the cause of the disease (i.e. feeding animal proteins to ruminants), and hopefully, options to eliminate any further disease outbreaks from a given source.

     The case has also had a negative effect on beef export markets. Japan has closed beef imports from the United States until a tracking system is in place. Japanese consumers want not only to be able to track the beef supply but also want the age verification that will come with the system.

     The disease is not normally associated with cattle under 30 months of age. Japanese officials have gone one step further and demanded that all beef imported be age verified 21 months or younger.

     The bio-security awareness in the U.S. has also been heightened since the 9/11 attacks of 2001. The American people want a way to trace any possible terrorist threat, and attacking the national food supply is a possibility. All of these factors contribute to the need for an animal identification and tracking system, and that is what the system is designed to be.

     Animal identification and tracking will be done by using different technology for different species. The goal of the system is not only to identify and track cattle, but also camelids (llamas and alpacas), bison, cervids (deer and elk), equine, goats, poultry, sheep and swine.

     Obviously the way that cattle are individually tagged would not be realistic with poultry, so research is being done on the best way to identify each species.

     There are two different technologies currently used with cattle. One is the use of bar coded ear tags. These would work fine if it were not for the weather factor. Bar code tags tend to become damaged and unreadable when exposed to inclement weather conditions.

     The other choice that has become the industry standard is the use of electronic identification tags. These tags work by bouncing a signal from a reader to the tag and back to the reader. They work very well and are very weather-tolerant

     The tags will be available from many commonly known ear tag manufacturers such as allflex and Y tex, and should cost about $2.00 for each tag. The producer does not need a reader. The producer will need only the tags and a tagger, paper, pencil and a place to store his records.

     The technologies are here and available for producers to use, but the first step in this process is to obtain a premises number. In order for the system to be able to trace an animal back to place of origin, it must have a record of each producer's location. Producers can now obtain their individual premise number, check with your state department of agriculture for availability in your area.