"In this day and age when we do so much business in foreign trade, we need the ability to identify trace an animal very quickly, identifying where it came from - where it has been, and where it is at today"
About this Quote
There is a whole worldview baked into Johanns's clunky, practical sentence: animals as mobile inventory, identity as paperwork, and speed as policy. The repetition - where it came from, where it has been, where it is today - turns a living creature into a supply-chain timeline. That’s not an accident. It’s the language of trade compliance, the kind of bureaucratic poetry that makes globalization sound like an engineering problem with a clean fix: traceability.
The specific intent is managerial reassurance. In an era when outbreaks (mad cow, foot-and-mouth, avian flu) can collapse markets overnight, “identify trace an animal very quickly” is code for protecting export access and calming skittish consumers without promising sweeping reforms. The phrase “in this day and age” signals inevitability: foreign trade isn’t a choice, it’s the weather, and policy must adapt.
The subtext is friction between public safety and producer resistance. Traceability systems often mean tags, databases, audits - costs that land on ranchers and processors. By framing it as a necessity of “doing so much business,” Johanns shifts the rationale away from domestic regulation and toward international competitiveness. It’s not Washington meddling; it’s the world demanding receipts.
Context matters: Johanns, as a Republican agriculture figure and later USDA secretary, operated at the fault line where rural political culture distrusts regulation even as agricultural commerce depends on standards. The quote works because it recasts surveillance as mobility’s companion: if animals travel like commodities, they must be documented like commodities. The bluntness is the point - a technocratic promise of control in a system defined by movement.
The specific intent is managerial reassurance. In an era when outbreaks (mad cow, foot-and-mouth, avian flu) can collapse markets overnight, “identify trace an animal very quickly” is code for protecting export access and calming skittish consumers without promising sweeping reforms. The phrase “in this day and age” signals inevitability: foreign trade isn’t a choice, it’s the weather, and policy must adapt.
The subtext is friction between public safety and producer resistance. Traceability systems often mean tags, databases, audits - costs that land on ranchers and processors. By framing it as a necessity of “doing so much business,” Johanns shifts the rationale away from domestic regulation and toward international competitiveness. It’s not Washington meddling; it’s the world demanding receipts.
Context matters: Johanns, as a Republican agriculture figure and later USDA secretary, operated at the fault line where rural political culture distrusts regulation even as agricultural commerce depends on standards. The quote works because it recasts surveillance as mobility’s companion: if animals travel like commodities, they must be documented like commodities. The bluntness is the point - a technocratic promise of control in a system defined by movement.
Quote Details
| Topic | Business |
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