National Livestock Identification System Alpaca and Llama ...

NLIS ALPACA AND LLAMA DATABASE OPTIONS REVIEW
given that there would not appear to be any major changes required to either system
to incorporate the needs of the alpaca and llama industries, this difference would
seem to be theoretical.
One substantial advantage that the NLIS database has is the fact that it has been
operated for a much longer period of time and this therefore fully “battle hardened”.
No amount of desk testing will ever find all the potential problems and conflicts that
will arise with the public release of a new system. Virtually all of the NLIS database
has been used for many years and is now fully field tested and stable.
ACCEPTANCE BY REGULATORY AUTHORITIES
The proposed regulatory database will, by definition, be used extensively by the
various regulatory authorities, both State and Federal. A very important aspect of the
selection of a suitable database will be the acceptance by these authorities of the
system used.
Ultimately, a high proportion of the data held in the system will be provided by the
regulatory authorities or will be subject to regulatory control. The State and Federal
jurisdictions are going to have to be satisfied that any system used provides the
following characteristics:
• The system is secure and the data is safely stored
• The system has sufficient redundancy and the data is securely backed up and
can be restored fully and quickly if required
• The business rules agreed on by industry and government are reflected in the
code and operation of the system
• The required data can be accessed quickly in time of emergency and the data
is in a format which allows rapid interrogation, understanding, dissemination
and transfer into other associated systems
• Ideally, all species should be kept in a single database to avoid duplication of
enquiries and to ensure the most efficient tracking in the event of an
emergency disease event
• The system interfaces with other existing systems such as the individual State
PIC registers
• There is no cost placed on the regulatory authorities in terms of usage costs
or modifications to their existing systems
• There must be the maximum amount of flexibility, simplicity and user support
built in to the system to allow stakeholders to meet their regulatory
requirements
• Reports required to ensure compliance must be able to be generated in a
format that allows adequate monitoring
• The ability to automatically export data on a regular basis to mirrored
databases set up in a number of states and federally
Unless the system proposed by the alpaca and llama industries meets these
requirements, it is unlikely that the system will receive the endorsement of the
regulatory authorities.
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