The USDA’s Two Biggest Nightmares About NAIS

The scenario that Miguel describes in his comment on yesterday’s posting–of regulators paranoid that wild animals or small herds of healthy animals will spark an epidemic among the immune-compromised animals of factory farms–was played out a few...

The Emotional Side of NAIS

The National Animal Identification System (NAIS) raises lots of emotion, if the comments about my BusinessWeek.com article (accompanying the article, and on this site) are any indication. Four points stand out to me: 1. The idea that NAIS discriminates against small...

The Good-Cop-Bad-Cop Routine for Implementing NAIS

As I was researching the National Animal Identification System (NAIS) for my new BusinessWeek.com column, I had this uneasy feeling I was missing data. It seemed that each time I tried to figure out what a particular state like Texas or Indiana was up to with regard...

How Do You End a Hunger Strike Short of Your Goal?

Ontario raw-milk farmer Michael Schmidt is into day 22 of his hunger strike to protest a government raid on his farm Nov. 21. And he is now trying to figure out how best to end the strike, short of his original goal of obtaining a promise from Canadian authorities...