Ranchers around the United States do not want a government program that tracks their cattle.  They say it’s too expensive, intrusive, and doesn’t work well.  The USDA’s National Animal Identification systems touts itself as being useful because it can track if a cow has mad cow disease or bovine tuberculosis.

Ranchers claim that the tags are so expensive and impractical that they could push them out of business.  Most cannot afford the cost of tags, scanning equipment, and filing reports of livestock movements.

Mr. Platt called the extra $2 cost of the electronic tags an onerous burden for a teetering industry and said he often moved horses and some of his 1,000 head of cattle among three ranches here and in Arizona. Small groups of cattle are often rounded up in distant spots and herded into a truck by a single person, who could not simultaneously wield the hand-held scanner needed to record individual animal identities, Mr. Plattsaid. And there is no Internet connection on the ranch for filing to a regional database.

Looking over the 22,000 acres that his cattle share with elk, pronghorns and mountain lions and where animals can easily disappear, Mr. Platt scoffed at the idea of reporting every death, as animal health officials prefer.

“They can’t comprehend the vastness of a ranch like this,” he said of federal officials. “They don’t appreciate what is involved logistically.”

The USDA claims that farmers don’t need to purchase anything except for the tags, which aren’t federally mandated.  They suggest that the tags could be read at auction, market or a feedlot.  However, they then go on to contradict themselves, stating that they hope to prod all states to require tags and be able to trace all animals.