CFIA urges birth date registration

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CFIA urges birth date registration
this document web posted: Wednesday April 27, 2005 20050428p73

By Barbara Duckworth
Calgary bureau

Cattle producers are encouraged to start entering birth dates of calves with the Canadian Cattle Identification Agency.

Several thousand producers have already entered birth dates from their 2004 calf crop on a voluntary basis, said Mabel Hamilton, chair of the agency and a beef producer from Innisfail, Alta.

Producers can correlate the tag number with the birth date of the calf or they can enter the starting date of calving and tie the identification numbers to that.

"A lot of big outfits can do it in batches," she said.

Each bag of radio frequency ear tags includes a printout of the numbers. These can be correlated to the first day of calving.

"You don't have to correlate the number to each calf," Hamilton said.

The push to enter birth dates is to satisfy international customers who want assurances the beef was produced from animals younger than 30 months and in the case of Japan, younger than 21 months. Checking teeth and examining carcasses at grading give a rough indication of an animal's birth but in the case of early maturing animals, this may not provide the true age.

"We know it trumps dentition," she said.

Producers enter the birth dates via the internet in a specially created form. To find it, go to http://www.producer.com and type "birth form" in the go box. For those who do not want to use the internet or do not have a computer, a producer can designate a veterinary or tag supplier to do it for them.

As more people adopt the electronic tags, trials will start at auctions and feedlots to test electronic readers.

Ultimately it is hoped every cattle liner, auction, feedlot and packer will have readers so all movement can be traced without resorting to time-consuming paperwork. The numbers will go to the identification agency and will remain there.

Brand inspectors are already using the system to monitor cattle, particularly those enrolled in the set-aside programs. There is no mandatory requirement for birth records but the Canadian Food Inspection Agency released a statement stating it strongly supports the initiative for this year's calf crops and future years.

"Birth date is being accepted as an alternative to dentition," said CFIA spokesperson Ruth Ann Partridge.

The CFIA will accept birth date information from the national CCIA database or the separate one in Quebec for domestic meat inspection as well as live animal or meat exports.

Producers who submit birth date information to the CCIA must connect the information with the identification numbers of the approved CCIA tags applied to calves. They must also keep a written or electronic record of the information in the event of an on-farm inspection.

All birth dates entered in the database are subject to third party auditing. CFIA inspectors will run the first audits but may eventually turn the duty over to provincial governments, private veterinarians, brand inspectors or other independent parties authorized by the government.

It is expected approximately 250 birth date records will be verified initially through on-farm inspection visits with a later audit.

If a birth date record proves to be false, the database will flag the record in question and the other birth date records from the producer during the same calendar year. These records will not be recognized as official, and cannot be used for domestic meat inspection or export certification purposes
 

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