First, the beef value chain round table is a great venue to discuss traceability, because we have all sectors around the table.
Approximately 10 or 12 years ago, the Canadian cattle industry made a big step forward in moving towards mandatory individual animal ID. This has provided us with the ability to do herd-of-origin trace back. That ability was instrumental in Canada obtaining controlled risk status at the OIE around the whole BSE issue. Of course, gaining that controlled risk status was instrumental in regaining market access. We do already have a traceability system at play in the cattle industry. We have basically a bookend system with the ability to do herd-of-origin trace back, and retirement of the tags at either processing or export.
We want to move forward as an industry eventually to full animal movement tracking, but we want to move forward carefully. The last thing we want to do is move forward hastily and bring extra regulatory burdens on an industry that competes globally. At the same time, technology is improving monthly. I think as those tag traceability trials have shown, the technology is still in catch-up mode, in terms of what we demand of it.
We're committed to seeing that premises ID is finalized across the country, and then moving to a phased implementation of movement tracking. At the same time, we hope technology will be improving so that we can move forward incrementally but progressively to eventual full traceability.