05/30/06 Animal ID, Australian style

Rick Stott of Idaho based Agri-Beef is back from a trip to Australia and New Zealand. He accompanied a Washington state trade delegation so he could learn more about the animal identification system the Australians are using. STOTT "We talked to truck drivers, livestock handlers and auctioneers and cattle buyers and cattle sellers. They believe they're so successful and that the adoption of the system is widespread enough that they're actually going to the next level of tracking individual cuts of meat back to the animal." Stott says the Aussies went through their growing cycle, admitted that they made mistakes, didn't have 100 percent buy-in and they could have done things differently. Stott says Australia has used animal identification as a marketing tool in Asia and everyone he spoke with had a message for the American beef industry. STOTT "Keep it up. Keep dinking around, keep debating the issue. Keep having misdirection and lack of coordination and lack of acceptance across segments of your industry. We appreciate that because we know every month that you can't make a decision that's another month that we're going to dominate the Asian market." Stott says he did come back with some ideas worth considering in the US and some pitfalls to avoid. That part of the story tomorrow. Today's Idaho Ag News Bill Scott