The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service plans to hold three additional public meetings on the animal disease traceability framework approach this month, in order to prepare for a USDA regulation to track animals moving interstate.
The sessions follow a Feb. 5, 2010 announcement by Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack that USDA will develop a new framework for animal disease traceability requiring states and tribal nations to establish the ability to trace back animals moving interstate to their state of origin.
USDA held an animal disease traceability forum in March 2010 in Kansas City to discuss how to develop the framework and ways to achieve traceability.
USDA hosted five public meetings in May and June to further the discussion of the new animal disease framework.
USDA’s last three public meetings to discuss animal disease traceability and plans for publication of the proposed rule are as follows:
The meetings will be held from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. local time in both Atlanta, GA, and Pasco, WA, and from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. local time in Madison, WI, with registration one hour prior to each meeting.
The notice for these meetings is published today in the Federal Register, www.aphis.usda.gov/newsroom/content/2010/08/traceability_meetings.shtml.
Today is also the last day to reserve a room at the Renaissance Denver Hotel for the Aug. 30-31, 2010 Joint Strategy Forum on Animal Disease Traceability co-hosted by the National Institute for Animal Agriculture (www.animalagriculture.org) and the U.S. Animal Health Association (www.usaha.org).