01/17/05 AFBF delegates address livestock issues

American Rancher January 17, 2005 The President of the American Farm Bureau Federation, Bob Stallman, says the organization's policy had supported re-opening the U.S. border to Canadian cattle, but at the annual convention last week, disagreement among delegates and the new cases of BSE in Canada, led the delegates to vote to let the Board of Directors to decide the group's position on the border issue. Stallman: "You know obviously we are concerned about our domestic industry. We are concerned about concerns of consumers, but at the same time we realize we need to be sure that we are working on a science based decision as opposed to decisions based on other factors." And Stallman said they will work with USDA to ensure that a return to normalized trade with Canada will proceed in an orderly fashion. Due to the impact on markets resulting from inconclusive BSE screening results here in the U.S., delegates approved a policy urging the USDA to report BSE results only after completion of the so-called "gold standard" test. Stallman says the American Farm Bureau delegates also voted to support voluntary country of origin labeling for livestock products, but mandatory country-of-origin labeling for other farm and food products. There was a lively debate on that issue. Stallman: "And if you remember one of the delegates said let's move forward. Let's keep the voluntary for livestock and then once we have animal ID then we can see how we proceed from there." I'm Bob Hoff.