By MIKE CORN

mcorn@dailynews.net

It's a mouthful of alphabet soup, but the USDA's decision on NAIS is drawing sharply contrasting responses.

Kansas Animal Health Commissioner George Teagarden is disappointed, Hays area cattleman Rick Chambers is delighted and Sharon Springs rancher Mark Smith thinks it's a move in the right direction.

NAIS is the National Animal Identification System, part of a mandatory program that many thought would be a virtual shoo-in, requiring cattlemen to register their premises, acquire radio frequency-driven ear tags and document movement of cattle from birth to the sale barn. The program would have affected all cattle producers, large and small.

On Friday, U.S. Department of Agriculture Tom Vilsack announced his agency effectively was dumping the animal identification program, turning it back to the states.

Only a small slice of the program was retained, involving interstate shipment of cattle. For the most part, that remaining slice will be little different from what already was required.

The animal identification program took on an air of urgency after the discovery of a single cow suffering from bovine spongiform encephalopathy -- mad cow -- in 2003.

In the wake of that discovery, Kansas implemented a voluntary plan. More than a year ago, the USDA hinted it was moving toward a mandatory program.

Teagarden said he listened in on the announcement by Vilsack, learning "each state can essentially do what ever they want."

"I will say I'm a bit disappointed," Teagarden said.

The voluntary system in Kansas, he said, has about 8,000 premises registered -- only about 22 percent of the total number Teagarden's agency estimated.

"I think it's a great step backwards," he said of the USDA's decision.

"I think it's a good thing," said Chambers, owner of Chambers Cattle and Trucking. Chambers also is vice president of the Kansas Cattlemen's Association. "It's not going to put a lot of small operators out of business."

KCA and R-Calf both had fought hard against the proposal, complaining it would require expensive solutions to a system that already has the wherewithal to trace cattle back to its origin.

Chambers said there's already a system that allows regulators to trace cattle back to their origins, through sales at sale barns, brands and shipping records. Cattle shipped in and out of Kansas, for example, already needed health certificates.

Proposals had suggested that expensive systems would be needed to monitor movement of cattle.

"There were no real ranchers or farmers that backed the idea," he said, mentioning a series of meetings conducted by USDA to hear comments on the plan. Out of the hundreds who attended, only a few supported the plan.

Chambers said he was surprised USDA backed off the program.

"It was one of those deals, they were going to shove it down our throat and we'd like it," he said of what he thought might happen.

For Smith, the newly elected president of KLA and a Wallace and Greeley county farmer and rancher, "it's a step in the right direction. So far, the news that's coming out is good."

KLA members, he said, had voiced concern that any system needed to be voluntary, employ minimal controls and remain confidential.