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AIM Global has published a technical report entitled 'RFID for Food Animal Identification in North America', developed in response to the recent US and Canadian mandates to improve lifetime tracking of cattle.
With frequent transport of food animals, primarily beef cattle, across borders in North America and recent BSE ("mad cow disease") incidents, both Canada and the US issued mandates to improve cattle tracking. The new report includes AIM Global's recommendations for the use of existing Low Frequency (LF) RFID ear tags (conforming to ISO 11784, ISO 11785, and ISO 14223) as well as Ultra High Frequency (UHF) (conforming to ISO/IEC 18000-6B, ISO/IEC 18000-6C, ISO/IEC 15961, ISO/IEC 15962, and ISO/IEC 15434).
UHF benefits
While both bar code and LF RFID ear tags have been available for a number of years, they encode only a unique animal ID, have limitations in range, and require access to an external database for pertinent data. Recommendations in the new report include provision for pertinent data to be recorded directly in memory on the ear tag, greatly speeding up data collection and animal identification.
AIM Global recognises the existing ISO standards for the use of Low Frequency (LF) RFID ear tags, but the report also details the benefits that could be recognised by using the expanded data content and read range available from newer UHF tags. These capabilities could help with the rapid identification of animals throughout the supply chain in the event of any biological or toxicological health threat.
Data capacity
The report also details how the expanded data capacity of UHF ear tags could be used to record data that would be of use to animal owners, feed lots, auction houses and processing plants, beyond simple compliance with government mandates. These benefits could provide economic incentives to use UHF RFID ear tags by providing individual users with instant access to animal management data.
Tests at Kansas State University, as well as tests performed by several wildlife management groups, have shown that UHF RFID can be used for food animal ID and is compatible with farming and ranching practices used in North America. The report outlines the use of expanded memory capacities and read/write capabilities of UHF RFID for food animal ID that are not available with current LF systems. It also highlights the greater read range provided by UHF systems that can simplify animal handling during identification.
Pilot schemes
With a number of wildlife management groups piloting UHF animal ID tags because of their increased read range and data capacity, there is a distinct probability that other types of food animals will also be identified using RFID ear tags in the future - another subject which the report addresses speculatively.
The complete report has been made available as a free download from the AIM Document Library - click here.
Source: AIM Global
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