SPRINGFIELD, Ill. - The Illinois Department of Agriculture (IDOA) has been chosen to host an international homeland security training exercise sponsored by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). The event, which will be held the week of June 16, 2009, in Wheaton, will include a two-day tabletop exercise that will simulate a Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD) outbreak.

"The Illinois Department of Agriculture is honored to host this vital training exercise, Agriculture Director Tom Jennings, said. "FMD is a highly-contagious livestock disease. Although it poses no risk to humans, the effects of this quick moving disease could devastate the livestock industry if not properly and rapidly contained."

Participants will include the USDA, Canada and members of the Multi-State Partnership for Security in Agriculture (MSP). Illinois is one of 13 states in the MSP, which is a collaborative forum of state Departments of Agriculture, State Veterinarian's Offices, Homeland Security Advisors and others.

"We are expecting around 100 people from across the nation and Canada to participate in this training," Director Jennings said. "We hope this exercise will encourage collaboration between states and help prevent duplication of efforts during an actual FMD emergency."

The training also will simulate a National Veterinary Stockpile (NVS) deployment. The NVS is a stockpile of medicine and equipment for animal health first responders. The stockpile would have to be shipped to a central location and then redeployed to the effected area. Three states including Illinois will be checking the readiness of their NVS deployment efforts.

The IDOA will be supported by the Illinois Emergency Management Agency and the Illinois Department of Public Health in the exercise. The USDA will provide the funding for the project.

This exercise is one in a series of safety measures that the department of Agriculture has undertaken to protect animal health and improve emergency preparedness. Other measures include:

• Scheduling agriculture emergency preparedness meetings to help farmers and ranchers prepare for potential agricultural emergencies. These presentations are intended to raise awareness about local and state efforts as they relate to agricultural emergency planning, bio-security, and the possible impact on producers. This is in addition to the department's IVERT efforts to train veterinarians as first responders in the event of an animal disease outbreak.
  
• Establishing an online premises identification registry to identify every farm, feedlot, sale barn and slaughter facility in the state that handles food animals. The registry is the first step toward implementation of a national animal identification system that will enable livestock and poultry to be rapidly traced in an emergency animal disease event.
  
• Requiring a permit for all livestock imported into the state for production or exhibition. The requirement gives state agriculture officials advance notice of farm animals entering Illinois and allows for faster tracing if diseased animals enter the state.
  
• Funding the development of a Geographic Information System to track agricultural assets such as farms, grain elevators and food processing plants. Once completed, the first-of-its-kind system will contain a valuable database of information to identify sensitive resources and aid decision-making during emergencies.

###