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Biotech is industry’s best line of defense The Kansas City Star Chuck Lambert, a former Kansas farmer who now is a senior federal regulator, is counting on science to protect the nation’s beef and agriculture industries. As deputy undersecretary for the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s marketing and regulatory programs, Lambert is one of the lead sentinels on alert for mad cow disease, avian flu and other diseases and pests with the potential to devastate the nation’s food supply industry. Sophisticated biotechnology tests are at the core of a stalwart early detection system. “It helps make the case we are doing what’s necessary to protect animal health and human health,” Lambert said last week during a visit to Kansas City. The region increasingly is embracing its agricultural and livestock heritage with an initiative emphasizing the economic contributions and growth potential of the animal health and nutrition industry. The Kansas City area is home to a notable concentration of companies in the animal health industry. The sector adds to the region’s research heft with its high-tech component consisting of companies making sophisticated pharmaceuticals and even DNA-based tests. It’s also big business. The more than 100 businesses in a region stretching from Manhattan, Kan., to Columbia generate 27 percent of sales in the United States and 30 percent of worldwide sales in a $14.2 billion animal health market, according to a study done for the KC Animal Health Corridor initiative. Lambert spoke to civic leaders at a corridor initiative event at the Stowers Institute for Medical Research. The extensive testing regimen, and follow-up plans involving rapid response to quarantine, vaccinate or eliminate any infected crops or animals, are critically important to public safety and the future of the agricultural industry, Lambert said in an interview. It also is the key to winning the confidence of overseas governments that closed their markets to billions of dollars of U.S. beef following the detection in this country of bovine spongiform encephalopathy, commonly known as mad cow disease, Lambert said. “Virtually every export market we lost for at least a short period of time,” Lambert said. “Some we were able to gain back.” It was only in the past couple of weeks that the flow of U.S. beef resumed into Japan, he said. South Korea has had teams in the country recently to inspect processing facilities as they decide whether to reopen their markets. U.S. officials are committed to maintaining rigorous inspection and enforcement to maintain public confidence here and abroad in the regulatory system, Lambert said. “We have seen what happens in some countries when the public loses that confidence,” said Lambert, who has Kansas State University animal science degrees as well as a doctorate degree in economics. “You tend to see overreaction and overregulation beyond what the science would indicate.” Beef producers were hit hard with the loss of overseas markets and have struggled to recapture them following the detection of mad cow disease, said John Crouch, executive vice president of the American Angus Association in St. Joseph. The industry is supportive of a testing approach relying on the latest biotech diagnostics to show that the beef supply is free of these diseases, or at least to provide an early warning so outbreaks can be isolated and controlled, Crouch said. “They are effective,” Crouch said. “They are scientifically proven to be accurate.”
Reproduced with permission of The Kansas City Star © Copyright 2006 The Kansas City Star. All rights reserved. Format differs from original publication. Not an endorsement. |
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