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Foot-And-Mouth Disease: USDA's Evaluations of Foreign Animal Health Systems Could Benefit from Better Guidance and Greater Transparency

Foot-and-mouth disease is highly contagious and affects certain livestock, including cattle. A domestic outbreak could cost the U.S. beef industry billions, and infected imported beef could lead to such an outbreak. [Source: GAO-17-373 [48 pgs] Published: April 28, 2017]

The U.S. Department of Agriculture evaluates the animal health systems of countries seeking to export beef to the U.S.-only approving those that they determine can assure disease-free beef.

Although USDA has a process for conducting such evaluations, it lacks detailed guidance for how its staff should document their analyses and results-leading to reliability and transparency concerns. We recommended USDA enhance its guidance.

What GAO Found

The U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service's (APHIS) process for evaluating the animal health systems of countries seeking to export beef to the United States consists of five steps:

  • A country requests that APHIS evaluate its animal health system.
  • APHIS gathers information about the country's system, including documents identifying (1) veterinary control and oversight programs, (2) vaccination programs, (3) animal identification and movement controls, (4) laboratory diagnostic capabilities, and (5) animal-disease emergency-response measures.
  • APHIS conducts in-country visits to verify and supplement this information.
  • APHIS does a risk analysis to determine whether the country's beef products pose a risk to U.S. livestock and begins to draft a risk analysis report.
  • APHIS determines an estimated risk level, which is included in the risk analysis report with a description of any mitigation measures the country must implement to ensure the safety of its beef exports. A report is completed and made public only for countries whose beef presents low risk. Countries whose beef poses a greater risk will not be eligible to export beef to the United States.

APHIS could strengthen its evaluation of foreign animal health systems by improving transparency to stakeholders, including the public. APHIS guidance instructs staff to adhere to timeframes for carrying out evaluations to ensure a lengthy process is completed efficiently. But the guidance does not instruct staff how to ensure evaluations are fully transparent. For example, APHIS guidance does not

  • direct staff to document their analysis of country information and include all problems and concerns identified and how they were resolved;
  • direct staff how to effectively document results of in-country visits, although the guidance requires these visits be documented; and
  • indicate how to incorporate guidance on transparency from USDA's Chief Information Officer and the Office of Management and Budget into final risk analysis reports.

Full text:
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-17-373?utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery