July 19— The Great Hall of the State House was not crowded. The Boston media sent no reporters. Yet the issue that brought the small farmers to Beacon Hill is a front page story: the Federal and State governments want to implant electronic “spychips” in every farm animal in the country.

If fully implemented, the expense of complying with the National Animal Identification System (NAIS) could ruin thousands of small livestock farmers, leading to a land clearance that will benefit only real estate developers and corporate agriculture. NAIS can also be seen as another giant step towards Homeland Security’s vision of the total surveillance society.

Spychips, or RFID microchips, contain unique identification numbers or data that can be read silently and invisibly by radio waves. Vast numbers of them are already been manufactured and disseminated in consumer goods, library books, and even human beings.

Who is listening

Only two legislators came to hear what the farmers had to say. Representative Robert Rice of Gardner thanked the farmers for bringing the issue to his attention. “I knew nothing of this before three months ago…it was under the radar,” he said.

State Representative Anne M. Gobi (D, Spencer) stayed and heard everything.

Patricia G. Stewart is a goat farmer in Ashburnham. She is a member of the national Liberty Ark Coalition and a founding member of the Small Holders Alliance.

Stewart explained that NAIS has three components.

(1) A seven-digit identification code for animals, which is already in effect.

(2) The electronic tagging of animals with Radio Frequency ID (RFID) chips—also known as spychips. The Feds want to expand the code to 15 digits. “It is problematic to put microchips on the ears, or under the skin” of animals, she said.

(3) Universal tracking. “Every time an animal leaves the premises, you must report within 24 hours where that animal went. If I don’t report within 24 hours, I could pay a fine of $1,000 per day.”

The RFID chips would include Global Positioning (GP) data. The GP satellites are under the control of the Pentagon. Signing on to this plan gives “a tacit approval” of the Feds’ “right to seize our animals.” But, she says, “I never signed anything… never gave my approval.”

Another farmer in the audience said that the State authorities were falsely claiming that over 1,100 had signed agreements to voluntarily comply.

An animal identification and tracking plan was presented to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) during the 2001 “Mad Cow Disease” scare. USDA didn’t accept that plan, so it was warmed over and presented as an “agro-terrorism” project.

The USDA website says that NAIS began to be implemented in 2004 as “a cooperative State-Federal-industry partnership. “NAIS is currently a voluntary program.… USDA has adopted a phased-in approach to implementation.… the draft strategic plan references mandatory requirements in 2008….”

That’s also the year when the Feds plan to implement a national ID card. In March the US Senate voted 100-0 to implement a national ID cards system in 2008.

Stewart says the NAIS plan assumes animals would be tracked in lots, which doesn’t make sense for small farms.

The Board which has been set up to administer NAIS represents only corporate agribusiness and marketing interests. So private information (from small farmers) is given to public agencies to be reviewed by other private parties (corporate farmers) who control those public agencies.

Feds just getting started

Jack Kittredge has a small farm in Barre, and is Social Action Coordinator for the Northeast Organic Farming Assoc-iation of Massachusetts

http://www.nofamass.org/index.php

“It suddenly came to dawn on people that the Federal government is serious about this,” he said. At present, small farmers face problems not so much from pending legislation, but from regulations and administration of existing legislation.

“In Massachusetts we have a very gung-ho Commissioner of Agricultural Resources...actively pursuing this” and “getting paid by the Feds to do this.”

The USDA has a pot of $33 million to subsidize State compliance with NAIS.

The State Commissioner of Agricultural Resources, Douglas Gillespie, has said that grazing animals outdoors would be prohibited if there is an outbreak of disease like Mad Cow. To Jack Kittredge, it’s crazy trying to combat Mad Cow, Avian Influenza and “terrorism” by applying NAIS to small organic farmers.

“In my mind [the reasons] don't make sense.” Why not test selectively for disease the way they do in Europe and Japan? Instead “the USDA has actually prohibited” private livestock operators from testing cows for the foreign market

To deal with Avian Influenza, they should be “going to the source, which is very large facilities”—factory farms where millions of genetically identical animals are confined in close proximity.

The influenza cannot normally evolve into forms that can cross over to human populations. Because infected birds usually die before they can pass the virus, it does not have a chance to mutate. But the ideal conditions for mutation exist in the factory farms, where birds live out their entire lives tightly packed into adjacent cubicles where they cannot even walk. “Our markets are seeking us out. because we raise birds in the healthiest outdoor conditions,” said Kittredge.

Kittredge dismissed the “Homeland Security” argument for NAIS. Any self-respecting terrorist skulking about will target “huge factory farms… It makes no sense to apply this to small rural operations.”

He believes that people can defeat the NAIS program by boycotting it. “If enough people did that, the Feds would back off from this program.”

Kittredge reported that in a NAIS-like pilot program that was run in Australia., implementation costs ran to $37 per animal. For small farmers “the costs are not going to be insignificant…its a serious threat to our way of life.”

The Australian data suggest that the spychip system is being tested on animals, at the expense of the farmers. Systems are being tested on humans on a voluntary basis. One test site is the Harvard Medical School, which plans to require spychips for its security staff and offer them to patients to record their medical history.

The farmers are watching as new legislation awaits action in the U.S. Congress.

HR 1254, the National Farm Animal Identification and Records Act, calls for “an electronic nationwide livestock identification system [for] all livestock born in the United States or imported…. The Secretary may use technology developed by private entities…to operate the livestock identification system.” One of its six sponsors is Congressman Barney Frank (D, MA).

HR 3170 would establish “a Livestock Identification Board to create and implement a mandatory national livestock identification system.… automated and electronic with participants using compatible technologies.”

for more information and to sign a pledge— www.libertyark.net