ccia - branding or tagging

[15444]

Why does the CCIA use tags to identify cattle when they should have producers use branding? Remember tags can be removed or fall out and the producer can get blamed for not tagging his cattle. With branding, every producer could have his own registered brand and nobody could remove the mark.

[dbluck]

The two major problems with branding (for CCIA purposes) are: 1. Readability. Packers require a id. that can be read in a few seconds. Shaving old brands will take to long and slow production. 2. Duplication. Brands are registered by province. Live cattle cross provincial(and the American) borders all the time. If a problem was detected at the packers, it would be difficult to determine whether the brand was local or out of province. Therefore the brand would not give the same traceback as a national tag system.

[15444]

Duplication would never be a problem if your brand was registered nationally. There are millions of combinations of brands you could use (i.e. numbers, letters, symbols). There are probably more combinations than producers in this country. As far as readibility is concerned, I really don't care if the packers can read it or not, at least were not wasting money on their stupid program.

[avanderwell]

Yes, I must agree with 15444 on this as we would have to pay to benefit the packers and the government while we receive nothing in return. Most of us already have brands and these have been the most effective form of permanent id which has been used for more than a hundred years and cannot be lost like a stupid tag (and costs you next to nothing as well).

[15444]

Thanks for your support vanderwell ! At least there is somebody who has some common sense and won't bow down to the goverments every word!

[dbluck]

What benefit is this program to packers that isn't a benefit to the cattle industry as a whole (or at all)???

[rip]

While I agree that branding is an important and necesary way of animal identification let us not forget a couple of facts. First it does cost us in lost hides. I realise that most of us in the cow/calf industry don't see the returns coming back to us it does come to the industry and there are producers who don't brand who are using it as a marketing tool when they sell to get a better price for their calves from the feeders. Second we cannot stick our head in the sand and do the same thing just because we have been doing it for the past hundred years. If we as producers want to remain leaders in the world as exporters of our product we have to listen to what the rest of the world is telling us we have to do to keep selling them beef. I think it is amazing how peoples attitudes change with the price of their product. If we were at an all time low cattle market and producers realised that a trace-back system would help market their cattle we probably wouldn't be hearing a lot of opposition.

[rsomer]

Rip: I have noticed lately that the Canadian Cattleman’s Association (CCA) are starting to wish the mandatory tagging program to be viewed as a marketing initiative rather than just herd health which was the focus previously. I am reminded of a quote from Sam Walton, the founder of Walmart, who mused that half of all marketing was time and money wasted…the trick was to figure out which half. The registration of our nations cow herd may or may not be money wasted but I have problems with the CCA making those marketing decisions on behalf of my business, and making me pay for it. The CCA, and I am going to refer to the CCA rather than the CCIA who are merely an operating arm of the CCA as is the Beef Information Center (BIC), does outstanding work on behalf of producers on consensus issues such as fighting the recent trade problems with the United States. But there is a problem with the CCA in that the CCA operates under the protection of a bureaucratic hierarchy that effectively insulates it from being directly responsible to the very producers whose interests the CCA is there to represent. I as a producer cannot vote out our CCA representatives (or for that matter the CCIA and BIC people) if I am unhappy with what is going on in the cloistered board rooms where these decisions are made. On controversial issues such as the tagging program the CCA then finds itself at odds with those producers who are uncomfortable with what the CCA is forcing them to do. I would question whether the CCA should be promoting controversial initiatives such as this mandatory tagging program on behalf of beef producers unless the people making these decisions (the directors of CCA) are willing to stand up before all producers and be elected by a direct producer vote. Until that happens that CCA should restrict its endeavours to issues with broad producer support such as fighting unfair trade. At the very least all beef producers should be able decide the future of their own industry by being given the right to vote yes or no to the mandatory registration and tagging of our nations cow herd.

[15444]

to rip If people used shoulder brands instead of hip or rib brands, we could get somewhat of a better price for our animals. A second of all, I don't really see why we can't keep our head in the sand. At least we don't have to take that extra effort and money to tag those calves before they leave the farm, instead of branding them at spring roundup when we do everything at the same time(e.g. vaccinaion, casteration.etc). I think everyone will agree that it is just so much simpler. I hope Jean Chretian likes his dinner because this program is just one more step that farmers think about in cons, not pros, when getting out of farming.

[bill]

With reference to rsommer June 10/00. I agree for the most part with your concept of the CCA's position. We sometimes have the perception that the CCA represents the primary producer. My understanding is that they represent the cattle industry which includes all of the industry with the cattle producer being just one of a group. The real representative of the primary producer is the ACC (in Alberta). The members of this association are elected and should be accountable to the producers. They are our represetatives on the CCA. It is my understanding that the initiative for a electronic identification came from the top down and the CCA through the sub-committee called the CCIA is only the messenger. I am sure the initiative never intended to have producer input.