Farm-Scape is sponsored by Manitoba Pork Council and Sask Pork Play Audio Farm-Scape is a Wonderworks Canada production and is distributed courtesy of Manitoba Pork Council and Sask Pork.

Farm-Scape, Episode 1289

The President of Canada Pork International says Canada's single case of BSE has clearly demonstrated the importance of being able to trace livestock back to its farm of origin.

Over 350 representatives of the global pork industry were on hand earlier this month in Birmingham, England for this year's World Pork Congress.

Canada Pork International President Bill Vaags says traceability emerged as the dominant issue during this year's session.

He says one single incident of mad cow disease in North America has caused a world wide disruption of trade showing just how vulnerable the meat industry is to such situations.

"There's all kinds of different approaches to traceability.

It's a new phenomenon that the whole world is undertaking and everybody has a different way of trying to figure out what's the most appropriate way of following through on traceability.

I think North America is probably going to be the leading force in having this traceability put on the agenda to make sure that the consumer, where ever that consumer may be, has the full assurance that this product was tracked as closely as possible.

Of course nothing is totally without risk.

There's always a chance of some risk of cross contamination or something but I think North America is really on the track of trying to make sure that the consumer who buys our product is fully confident that we have a very good system in place".

Vaags says mad cow is on everyone's mind.

He says the BSE incident is affecting everyone throughout the food chain, not just those involved in beef production.

He says the hope is that the science will quickly prove the problems have been addressed and that the Canadian beef industry can soon resume shipping product.

For Farmscape.Ca, I'm Bruce Cochrane.