National Institute for Animal Agriculture:
National Animal Identification System Membership Opinion Survey

Question 25 of NAIS Opinion Survey, conducted among NIAA Members

NOTE: This survey is opinion-based and does not represent a scientific measure. The following results are intended for NIAA membership use only.  Any reproduction of the following is prohibited without expressed consent of NIAA. 
25. Please list the biggest immediate obstacle you see in implementing NAIS.
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 Funding, organization, infrastructure, state participation/education, buy-in by animal industry.
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 National database and voluntary/mandatory
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 The unwillingness of USDA to let the private sector coordinate the system, in cooperation with USDA, could very well lead to a system that becomes antiquated over time and unlikely to be able to address issues in a timely fashion.
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 Cost to producers
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 Federal level has consistantly delivered less than promised and much later than promised. We have been forced to delay and change our plans constantly due to poor communication by APHIS
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 Limited or completely lacking communication on direction, progress and plans to all parties including state animal health officals, industry and producers. Also lack of "offical" approval of basic standards from the USAIP that are expected to be part of the NAIS, but which have not been formally adopted leading to reluctance to move forward.
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 Uncertainty related to the details of the eventual program related to the first seven items listed in question 21 above.
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 Confidentiality of data requested and selection and distribution of funding to states
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 unwillingness of producers
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 Decisions for implentation and funding source for the infrastructure.
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 confidentiality, funding, and database infrastructure
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 The cordination of states to produce premise ID's.
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 Producer Confidence in the overall system
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 There has been no clear direction from USDA on how the the complete NAIS will be structured and implemented. USDA is attempting to implement a premises ID system without providing stakeholders direction or a clear vison of the scope of the animal ID and tracking systems. At the state level, we're tryinbg to build a foundation without having the plans for the structure that will sit on it.
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 There seems to be a preconceived plan that USDA surfaces in stages independent of input outside of USDA. Trust is in question. Is input really wanted?
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 lack of informed producer,funding,confusion of available id systems
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 Federal $$$. It must be funded adequately or it will be a disaster..!!
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 Confidentiality and the lack of confidence in the USDA to manage a database of that size and complexity. They have difficulties managing the GDB currently (self admitted). They need to empower states and private entities to administer consistent systems where data can be protected, and collaborate on disease investigations as needed. This will never work if USDA continues with their "turfism" mindset and insists on owning all the data. Producers will not participate, at which point it will have to be Congessionally mandated which will result in pushback and compliance failures.
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 producer participation without federal level laws in place that protect against breeches of confidentiality and liability. Lack of authorizing legislation to police the system for compliance failures.
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 USDA has been tone deaf and unresponsive to industry and state concerns. USDA focus has been on a USDA-centered program, regardless of the cost to industry or states. A decentralized system that involves states and the private sector as partners can meet the needs of USDA and address the privacy and confidentiality issues from producers.
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 Goofy USDA politics and resistance from Producers and Industry; which will be trumped by consumer reaction to a FMD outbreak here that might destroy the industry as we know it now.
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 Buy in from producers. Lack of information on cost, timeline, and confidentiality.
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 1- Producer, local and state buy-in and function.
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 Producer resistence, especially from small producers.
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 A voluntary system, inadequately funded and with data security concerns will lead to little producer participation.
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 Few at USDA have a clue on how to implement, from a big picture, the NAIS. The grant NAIS/USDA grant process is a perfect example of this. Are some states now re-writing the grants, after they were awarded, to deal with database issues? No one is going to roll over and let USDA constantly monitor animal I.D. databases so they can look like they have an effective program when the next disease issue comes up. In fact, most everyone outside Washington knows USDA is no further ahead with an effective I.D. program than they were before BSE was detected. I'd prefer a mandatory system, but if USDA makes their current plans mandatory, they'll need an army of people to enforce it.
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 confidentiality harmonization of technologies cost voluntary participation
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 Lack of funding for data collection infrastructure (i.e. readers at markets / collection points.)
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 We cannot handle individual id of market pigs any more than we can handle individual id of chickens.
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 I am from Australia wher the ational scheme will be mandatory by July 1st 2005, and I understand what ou are going through. I have also supplied all the reading equipment, over 700 systems to Botswana in Africa, which is also fully mandatory. they did it well, it was mandatory and no discussions. This is human food chain issue, not a cattlemans right to have his say. It has to be driven from the consumer protection aspect, otherwise there will always be objections from people crying big brother or people invloved in cattle theft who make the most noise and will try almost anything to have the scheme deferred for as long as possible.
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 Producer, local, and state buy in and function
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 A voluntary, technology neutral approach
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 Communication
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 Producers and processors with whom we've interacted are very concerned about data confidentiality. The Data Trustee concept is one that we believe can work, and needs to be trialed as an alternative to a centralized data storage.
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 producer participation
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 USDA ignorance
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 Government unwillingness to mandate individual animal identification in a timely manner. the debating has gone on too long.
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 Producer resistance, technical complications with datal collection and warehouseing, program cost to for producers to comply
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 Producer Education & Communiucation
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 Too many people in USDA and state vets with no practical ID experience are making rules for the problems they know nothing about. As a result, systems that are almost identical to the NAIS that have been in operation by DSPs for years are being overlooked. Each industry should be allowed to fend for itself and implement what works best for their particular scenario.
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 Data management for premise allocation.
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 Bureaucracy and lack of information before implementation; training of procedures by inexperienced extension personnel instead of veterinarians.
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 Federal allocator not accurate/totally functional yet.
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 communication
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 Final decisions on various aspects must be made. Producer involvement. 
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 I'm a free-marketeer, but I'm concerned that some stakeholders see this project as a windfall for them personally (i.e. greed).
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 Despite efforts to communicate with producers, the vast majority are not well informed, are confused and believe it is unnecessary.
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 Confidentiality is the biggest obstacle. If confidentiality is successfully addressed, data management concerns can be more easily addressed. However, we connot overlook the need for significant levels of continued funding to support the program and we cannot expect our industries to foot the bill for the program.
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 ALL GROUPS MUST UNITY AGAIN AND RETURN BACK TO THE CONSENSUS REACHED IN 2002-2003 AND QUIT TRYING TO CHANGE THE CONSENSUS REACHED THROUGH 2 1/2 YEARS OF DICUSSSION MAINLY DRIVEN BY MONETARY REASONS. EFFORTS TO KEEP CHANGING THE CONSENSUS AND HAVING EACH GROUP GO OFF IN THEIR OWN DIRECTION WILL ONLY SLOW DOWN THE PROGRESS.
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 Getting it right. We must proceed with caution, complete the pilots, learn and adjust from those experiences.
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 there are 4 actually Confidentially, liability, funding, and a national database vs state/regional private databases.
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 The lack of an aggressive timetable for mandatory identification by the federal government
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 Concensus between for government and industry on path to move forward; will only be successful if policies are clearly stated and communication is improved.
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 FAilure to speak with one voice. Too many persons giving information with termanology that is confusing even though unintentional.
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 Confidentiality, liability, & funding are simultaneously, & probably equal in weight, obstacles to successful implementation.
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 In pertaining to equine, the biggest obstacle to implementation is that there are too many private agendas, both political and financial, among decision makers. The original intent of the Plan is being overlooked and complicated by those who seek gain on personal or association levels.
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 Hired help
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 Making the data non-FOIA-able
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 Industry diversity
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 Uniformity in the States
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 1. Must be a mandatory program tied to Premises ID. 2. Producers must understand how NAIS will be used and how personal data kept confidential. The federal government has been less than successful with human health patient files. So if history repeats itself, where are the firewalls? 3. Must have ability to integrate with a cooperative program with government and private insurance industry for risk management (a true catastrophic disease and named peril event insurance program for livestock, not hedging) as part of the forward integration of the system. Without risk management the NAIS is primarily reactive, which although one of its purposes, it is not all that it can be. Without the ability to be proactive in the strategy to deal with a catastrophic disease event it is only a tool with a short handle. The use of NAIS system for monthly inventory reporting in an insurance model, allows for state and federal regulatory personnel to instantly and accurately have awareness of geographic locations of livestock populations, including those on shared grazing lands as a tool to apply quarantines, yet keeps ownership and other data out of the first level of “need to know” until individual animal testing begins. It also provides financial resources immediately to owners of animals caught in a quarantine and additional funds for diagnostic work, minimizing the impact to a state or a region. 4. Must enlighten R-calf as to the global economics of world markets. Some R-calf group leaders have expressed resistance to NAIS and seem to fail to understand how world consumer confidence is tied to the program -much more so than COOL. They do not seem to be willing participants potentially undermining the “all-voluntary” system. 5. While developing the platform, strongly consider being able to use NAIS to document the incidence of animal diseases in the future in an anonymous way. It is important to maximize the return on investment for time and dollars spent on implementation and development. The vision for NAIS might be well to include openings for expansion for the good of the industry.
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 There are a great many challenges in reliably reading RFID devices at the speed of commerce. These technology limitations must be overcome in order for this to work.
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 In order to gain producer support and to ensure our country's safety from bioterrism, the NAIS data MUST be held confidential.
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 Infrastructure to implement it.
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 The lack of central leadership allowing states and industry to fragment.
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 State and federal acceptance of electronic transfer of info on animal movement.
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 Getting the infrastruture in place to support and manage the system.
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 I don't see that the USDA is going to really get funding appropriated to specific "industries". The equine industry needs specific dollars assigned for its pilot programs, and the money seems to be channeled through governmental agencies, and not through the industry that has come together to address the issue. I think ultimately this thing will get decided "for" us, rather than "by" us.
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 Data confidentiality related to data collection and storage. Until those issues are resolved to meet with the laws and governence, all timelines and milestones are null and void.
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 Failure of a clear path to follow, i.e. voluntary vs, mandatory. Voluntary want work. Too many opinions being expressed with changing terminology that confuse the issue.
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 1. resistance by producers 2. lack of uniformity of info flow 3. federal support 4. US RFID vendors working to keep ISO out of the US
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 Funding Infrastructure Compatability
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 Getting the information without tying the hands of the producer to carry out their business. This would be most true in the swine business. In other programs there are times that the rules don't allow for common sense things to occur. It would be impractical to individually ID all swine and poultry. This is not needed also due to the nonmovement practices of individual animals. Movements involve flocks or groups.
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 It has become a political hot potato that is not being funded nor agressively moved toward implementation. Establish a date for startup by region and deal with the real issues that come up. If RFID is to be the tecnology to be used say so and if not tell people. This program seems more like the blind directing the blind.
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 voluntary compliance from small farmers, ranchers
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 Agreement among the many stakeholders.
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 communication of the details, and an out dated expensive sytem before it gets off the ground.
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 In a voluntary system, unless a producer is part of an alliance or supply chain, little to NO incentive exists to participate. (Many are not large enough to be part of an alliance even if they want to. However, such a system could develop into a seperation of industry into "haves" and "have nots" to the financial detriment of many producers.)
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 Lack of incentatives for most small producers to participate in a voluntary program
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 producer cooperation
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 Distrust by producer
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 NAIS is, at present, a program designed for and by dairy industry (and their key stakeholders) who seem unwilling to see problems it will cause to other industries particularly livestock hauliers and markets.
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 durable and effective ways of collecting the data
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 State to state differences in agriculture, government, and effective collaborative experience. Bureauracy.
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 funding
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 1. solving the confidentiality issue so producers will be willing to participate 2. funding

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