National Animal Identification System
The National Animal Identification System, (NAIS) is a government-run program in the United States intended to extend government animal health surveillance by identifying and tracking specific animals. Administered at the federal level by the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, a branch of the United States Department of Agriculture, NAIS will also be overseen by state animal health boards. While the federal program is voluntary, money received by some states, tribes, and non-profit entities from the USDA through cooperative agreements has been used to make parts or all of the program mandatory.
Critics claim the system will put small farmers out of business, by requiring that farmers pay the cost of registration devices of between $1 and $20 for each animal. Large, corporate factory farms which are connected to vertically integrated, birth-to-death factory systems ID and pay by the herd (and not the individual animal), while small farmers must pay it for each animal.
Read more about National Animal Identification System: Overview, Benefits, Concerns, Other Countries, See Also
Famous quotes containing the words national, animal and/or system:
“Ignorance, forgetfulness, or contempt of the rights of man are the only causes of public misfortunes and of the corruption of governments.”
—French National Assembly. Declaration of the Rights of Man (drafted and discussed Aug. 1789, published Sept. 1791)
“An animal can learn to fight, but to sing beautiful things and make people believe them....”
—Dalton Trumbo (1905–1976)
“The individual protests against the world, but he doesn’t get beyond protest, he is just a single protester. When he wants to be more than that, he has to counter power with power, he has to oppose the system with another system.”
—Friedrich Dürrenmatt (1921–1990)