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Latest alert: June 21: Appropriations bill links NAIS to school lunch program!  Calls needed now!!

***Latest News: 62 organizations, including FARFA, signed a letter to the House Appropriations Committee asking them not to link NAIS to the School Lunch Program***

*** Send this press release to  your local newspaper and ask them to cover the story!  Or use the material in it to write a letter to the editor. Help us get the media's attention!***

The Good News from Congress

NAIS is not in the Farm Bill!  After a long, protracted fight over the issue, Section 10305 of the Farm Bill was removed by the conference committee before the bill was passed by Congress.  Section 10305 would have amended the Animal Health Protection Act to provide a definition of NAIS and create an exemption from the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) for information collected under NAIS.  While people differed on whether a FOIA exemption was a good thing or not, the key problem with Section 10305 was that it would have implied Congressional approval of NAIS.  Getting the section removed from the 700+ page bill was a long shot, but we did it!  Read more here.

The Bad News from Congress

One Thursday, June 19, Congresswoman DeLauro (D-CT) inserted a provision into the Agriculture Appropriations bill that would require school lunch programs to buy meat from NAIS-registered farms.  This government coercion uses the issue of healthy food for children as a way to force farmers into an unpopular program that will not improve food safety!  Read more and take action here.

 USDA News

The Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund has filed a Notice of Intent to Sue the USDA and the Michigan Department of Agriculture to stop NAIS. The arguments raised would impact NAIS nationwide!  Read more at the FTCLDF website.   

In a suit brought by Mary Zanoni, the court has issued a temporary restraining order preventing USDA from applying its Privacy Act Notice to the NAIS information.  This is a wonderful roadblock in USDA's plans to be able to conceal information about NAIS from the public, while at the same time sharing people's information with all sorts of other government agencies.  Note: although there has been some confusion, this case does not stop the agency from registering people's property or collecting their information under NAIS.   Read the court order here and stay tuned to see what happens.

In December 2007, USDA has released its Business Plan for implementing NAIS.   One of the strategies in the Business Plan is for breed reigstries to require NAIS animal identification numbers (AIN's) for registration.  Find out whether your breed registry or livestock association plans to require NAIS participation -- click here! 

Here are a few highlights from the Business Plan:

• USDA plans to use existing disease control programs to force NAIS, by phasing out all other numbering systems. 
• While various horse groups have claimed that horses will somehow end up being exempt from NAIS, the Business Plan places horses in "Tier 1" as a "targeted species" for implementation. 
• The USDA continues to ignore the low-cost, practical alternatives for tracing animals, and acts as if a huge federal program is the only solution. 

You can find FARFA’s comments on the USDA User Guide on our Articles page.