Source: National Farm Animal Care Council
The 23-member Code Development Committee (CDC) met for the first time in its entirety in mid-September. Prior to that, the CDC had only met virtually in smaller groups of between 7 and 12 members over a series of 5 meetings comprised of 11 sessions. Of course, due to restrictions linked to the pandemic, the meeting of the full CDC was held in virtual format, and that in and of itself presented several challenges for such a large group. As such, the 2-hour session was used to “kickoff” the process and to introduce CDC members who represent the primary users of the Transportation Code of Practice: livestock and poultry transporters.
The four transporters were given the opportunity to talk about the industry at-large, as well as their own personal backgrounds and experiences in order to provide relevant and important insights into their day-to-day experiences. Amongst other topics, transporters talked about the impact of the myriad of trucking- and welfare-related regulations that need to be balanced, in both typical and post COVID-19 worlds. The session was hosted by Code Manager Jeff Spooner (our resident facilitator-extraordinaire), who posed questions to the transporter panel, and then moderated a Q&A session for all participants.
Three of the five CDC sub-committees have been targeted to complete their work earlier than the other two. The first meeting of the Loading and Unloading sub-committee has been scheduled for late November. Planning for inaugural meetings for the other two sub-committees are currently in the works.
Two orientation sessions for the Intermediary Sites Working Group (WG) were held in October. Work is currently underway to organize an online session at which relevant content from the Scientific Committee report will be presented.
Some species-specific WGs continue work on their sections. A sub-group that is responsible for drafting poultry catching content continues to meet, as does the over-arching Poultry Transportation and CatchingWG that is tasked with reviewing content advanced by the sub-group. The Hatchery WG continues to review content drafts, and is expected to hold a virtual meeting in January, 2021. The Mink/Fox/Rabbit WG is tying up loose ends on its section, and is also expected to meet in January. The Bison/Cervid WG has determined that it has gone as far as it can without common content from the CDC, and has decided that it will join other walk-on species WGs in “pause” mode while the CDC and its sub-committees continue their work.
Previous progress reports are available here.
For information on the steps of the Code development process and progress of the Codes being updated follow this link.
Funding for this project has been provided through the AgriAssurance Program under the Canadian Agricultural Partnership, a federal–provincial–territorial initiative.
