NAIS and the Agriculture Census

[Guest guest]

When asked where the MDA had obtained addresses for its

solicitation of NAIS

premises IDs, Dr. Goff stated: " the mailing was done through a

contract with

the USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service, [NASS]. "

January 17, 2007

A Lawyer Farmer's View of NASS

<http://nonais. org/index. php/2007/ 01/17/a-lawyer- farmers-view- of-

nass/>

Commentary <http://nonais. org/index. php/category/ commentary/> ¡ª

walterj

7:08 pm The 2006 Agricultural Identification Survey and the NASS/NAIS

Identity

by Zanoni, Ph.D., J.D.

Like many small-farm advocates, I have been fielding questions over

the past

few weeks about the above survey being sent out by the National

Agricultural

Statistics Service (NASS). Many people ask if there is any

relationship between

the survey and the data being collected (often without the knowledge

or consent

of farmers) for the National Animal Identification System (NAIS). As

we shall

see, although USDA personnel won't admit it, NASS data is the

foundation of the

USDA's aggressive pursuit of NAIS.

To my great surprise, in this morning's mail I myself received a 2006

Agricultural Identification Survey (2006 AIS). I say " to my great

surprise, "

because I am not and never have been engaged in any type of commercial

agriculture whatsoever. I have never before received any type of

communication

from NASS.

The envelope states in very large letters, " YOUR RESPONSE IS REQUIRED

BY

LAW. " The envelope further states that the due date is January 29,

2007. As

explained below, it is clear that many people receiving this form are

not in

fact " REQUIRED BY LAW " to answer it. Further, a recipient has only a

couple of

weeks between the receipt of the form and the purported deadline, and

it would

be impossible for the average non-lawyer to do enough research within

that time

to figure out whether he/she is or isn't actually required to respond.

The form itself begins with several general questions, such as " Do

you own or

rent any land? " " Do you grow vegetables, hay or nursery stock? " " Do

you receive

government payments? " The questions appear deliberately designed to

imply that

anyone who would answer " yes " is among those " REQUIRED BY LAW " to

fill out this

form. The USDA is thus casting a very wide net in this particular

intrusion into

the lives of American citizens, because, frankly, just about everyone

who is not

homeless " owns or rents " real estate; some 75 million people in the

United

States " grow vegetables; " and some 60 million people

receive " government

payments. " (See 2007 Statistical Abstract of the United States, Table

1226

(vegetable gardening); Table 528 (government transfer payments).)

Now, perhaps it is possible that this " wide net " might not be as

intrusive as

it appears. After all, maybe NASS has only sent this form to people

reasonably

assumed to be farmers. But in fact it was distressingly easy to

confirm that

intrusiveness and deliberate over-inclusiveness are the hallmarks of

the NASS

approach. This morning, I called the information number listed on the

form and

spoke to a woman at the USDA's Helena, Montana call center. According

to her,

the call center is being swamped with calls from people who live in

cities and

have nothing to do with agriculture. She stated that the call center

employees

really have no idea of why or how all these people have been sent the

2006 AIS.

When asked for som conjecture as to how so many unnecessary people

could have

been included in the mailings, the woman explained that, for example,

anyone who

had ever subscribed to a " horse magazine " might have been included in

the

database.

Now, that raises interesting questions. How is the USDA/NASS getting

the

subscription lists of " horse magazines " ? Why and how are " horse

magazines, "

or, for that matter, any rural-life publication, any breed

association, feed

store, or private or public livestock or horticultural enterprise

whatsoever,

giving their member/subscriber/ customer lists to the government

without telling

their members, subscribers, or customers?

Or, worse yet, how is the government accessing such lists or

databases without

the awareness of the businesses or organizations in question? During

times when

the Executive Branch of the United States Government has secretly

gathered the records of most people's incoming and outgoing phone

calls, and

the President asserts a right to open your mail and my mail without a

warrant,

this is not a trivial question.

Returning to the first page of the form, we see the wide net growing

ever

wider. The form states: " Many people who don't consider themselves

farmers or

ranchers actually meet the definition of a farm or ranch and are

important to

agriculture. " " We need your completed form even though you may not

be actively

farming, ranching, or conducting any other type of agricultural

activity. "

Finally, the first page of the form reinforces the threat of

the " REQUIRED BY

LAW " language of the envelope: " 'Response to this survey is legally

required

by Title 7, U.S. Code.' " (Emphasis in original.) (Note the single-

double

quotation marks ¡© the threat actually is in quotation marks,

employing that

common tenth-grade stylistic conceit of " quoting " something to make

it appear

extra-important.) One senses evasions aplenty here ¡ª the form has

referred to

the " definition of a farm or ranch " but nowhere tells us that

definition. It

suggests that anyone receiving a form has a legal

obligation to answer it, even though their

enterprise may not meet the definition of a " farm. "

Given the foregoing ambiguities, I had further questions about the

definition

of a " farm " and the possible legal penalties for not responding to

the 2006 AIS.

Specifically, I asked if my understanding of the definition of " farm "

as an

operation with at least $1000 in sales from agriculture was correct.

(See 2002

Census of Agriculture, FAQs, HYPERLINK

" http://www.nass. usda.gov/ census_of_ agriculture/ frequently_

asked_questions/ index.asp#1¡È www.nass.usda. gov/census_

of_agriculture/

frequently_ asked_questions/ index.asp #1.

<http://www.nass. usda.gov/ census_of_ agriculture/ frequently_

asked_questions/ index.asp#1.> ) Further, having found the penalty

listed in 7

USC ¡×2204g (d) (2), namely, that a " person . . . who refuses or

willfully

neglects to answer a question . . . . shall be fined not more than

$100, " I

noted that, insofar as the 2006 AIS actually contains 42 separate

questions, it

could be

important to know whether there was a separate $100 fine for each

unanswered

question, or just a single $100 fine for not answering the entire

2006 AIS.

These questions were beyond the purview of the call-center woman, so

she made a

note of the questions, referred them to a member of the NASS

professional staff,

and promised that the NASS staff member would call me with the

answers.

The next day, January 12, 2007, I received a call from Jody Sprague,

a NASS

statistician. First we addressed the question of the " farm "

definition. Ms.

Sprague conceded that someone whose property or operation did not

meet the

" farm " definition would have no obligation to answer the 2006 AIS.

She also

conceded that the basic definition of a " farm " as an operation with

at least

$1000 in agricultural sales was correct, but explained that in

addition to the

gross sales figures, NASS also assigns certain " point values " for

particular

agricultural activities. If the points add up to 1000, your operation

would

meet the definition of a " farm. " When asked for an example of how the

point

values work, Ms. Sprague explained that 5 equines would equal a farm

but 4 would

not. (Subsequently, she explained that each equine equals 200

points.) When

asked how many cattle equal a " farm, " Ms. Sprague said she did not

know. At one

point Ms. Sprague said that NASS wanted, through the 2006 AIS, to

determine if

they could delete people who should not be on their

mailing list. But for the most part she contended the opposite, e.g.,

that she

would " advise " anyone who had received the form to fill it out; and

that even a

person with one horse should complete the questionnaire, although she

previously

had conceded that someone with fewer than 5 horses would not meet the

definition

of a " farm " and therefore

would not be required to fill out the survey.

We next turned to the issue of how NASS may have compiled its mailing

list for

the 2006 AIS. First Ms. Sprague maintained that the sources of the

NASS

mailing list are " confidential. " I noted the call-center woman's

reference to

a subscription to a " horse magazine " as a source of names, and asked

for some

other possible sources. Ms. Sprague said that growers' associations,

such as the

Wheat Growers' Association and Barley Growers' Association, were

examples of

sources. I asked for more examples but she was reluctant to give

any, claiming that some are " confidential " and some are " not

confidential. "

She explained the overall process of list building thus: as NASS

comes across

lists where there are " possibilities of agricultural activity, " NASS

incorporates those names into its mailing list.

We returned to the subject of " point values " for different livestock.

Explaining that many people were likely to have questions about this,

I asked if

Ms. Sprague could find out for me the point values of cattle or other

non-equine

livestock. She put me on hold for a long while. Subsequently, she

gave me the

following point values: beef cattle, 310 points per head; dairy

cattle, 2000

points per head; goats and sheep, 50 points per head. (I wanted to

ask about

chickens, but I was getting the distinct sense that I might be

pushing my luck.)

Ms. Sprague stressed that she did not want people to be concentrating

on the

point values. For example, she noted that people should not say they

have 4

horses if they really have 5 horses, " because it wouldn't be

ethical. " (But

apparently under the NASS moral code, rummaging through some of those

Choicepoint- type consumer profiles to track your reading habits is

perfectly

" ethical. " And, as we shall see, the NASS moral code also permits

forking over

your data to states that are in hot pursuit of the NAIS premises-

registration

quotas imposed as a condition for the states' continued receipt of

federal NAIS

grant money.)

We went on to the question of the $100 non-compliance fine. Ms.

Sprague assured

me that a farmer's failure to answer any or all of the 42 total

questions on the

2006 AIS would only result in a single $100 fine. She also said that

the fine is

" rarely enforced " and that if any " producer " " chooses " not to report,

no one

from NASS would seek them out.

Finally, I asked Ms. Sprague if there were any relationships between

NASS and

the APHIS NAIS program, and she said, " Absolutely none. " I asked her

if any

other agency, state or federal, would ever be allowed to use NASS's

database to

solicit premises IDs for NAIS, and she said, " Absolutely not. " And

indeed,

pursuant to 7 U.S.C. ¡× 2204g (f) (3), " Information obtained [for

NASS surveys]

may not be used for any purpose other than the statistical purposes

for which

the information is supplied. "

Several weeks ago, Missouri antiNAIS activist Doreen Hannes sent a

series of

questions about Missouri's solicitation of NAIS premises IDs to Steve

Goff,

DVM, the Animal ID Administrator of the Missouri Department of

Agriculture

(MDA). Dr. Goff provided written answers on December 20, 2006. When

asked where

the MDA had obtained addresses for its solicitation of NAIS premises

IDs, Dr.

Goff stated: " the mailing was done through a contract with the USDA

National

Agricultural Statistics Service. "

I won't answer my 2006 Agricultural Information Survey. Instead, I

will send a

copy of this article to my Congressman and my two United States

Senators. I will

ask them to have the House and Senate Agriculture Committees

investigate the

rampant and shameful abuses of federal law and common morality

inherent in

NASS's compilation of its mailing lists and use of those lists to

promote the

APHIS National Animal Identification System. Why will I do this?

Because I don't

live by the USDA's false code of ethics; I answer to a higher

authority.

Copyright 2007 by Zanoni. The following article may be

distributed solely

for personal and non-commercial use without prior permission from the

author.

Non-commercial distribution and posting to assist in disseminating

information

about NAIS is, in fact, encouraged, so long as proper credit is given

and the

article is reproduced without changes or deletions. Any other

distribution or

republication requires the author's permission in writing and

requests for such

permission should be directed to the author at the address/phone/ e-

mail address

below.

Zanoni, Ph.D., J.D.

P.O. Box 501

Canton, NY 13617

mlz@... <mailto:mlz@ ...

<\_~

_//\\

" They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary

safety

deserve neither liberty nor safety " Ben lin 1759

" Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving

safely in a

pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside,

thoroughly used

up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming... " Wow! What a ride! "