Newswise — As the public reacts to the largest beef recall in the nation's history, a communications expert at Missouri University of Science and Technology can offer insight into why the Department of Agriculture's cattle-tagging system has failed.
Dr. David Wright, assistant professor of English and technical communications at Missouri S&T, has completed extensive research into the failure of the National Animal Identification System, which was designed to work much like the bar code scanner and database at the supermarket. The system would have tracked animals from their place of origin to their final destination. It also would have been capable of collecting detailed information about inventory and sales.
"Beef is being pulled from menus despite the fact that there have been no reported cases of illness," says Wright. "However, due to the very public nature of problems with specific diseases in the beef industry during the past few years, people have become reactionary to news of this kind. If there had been widespread illness resulting from tainted meat, it is unlikely that we could determine the source of that meat or its shipping locations because of our lack of a national animal identification and tracking system."
Wright says that if the Department of Agriculture is still serious about promoting a National Animal Identification System, they should renew efforts to educate buyers, sellers and ground-level beef producers on the merits.
More information about Wright's research is available at http://news.mst.edu/research/2007/Cattle-communication.html .
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