The Agriculture and Homeland Security Departments are working together to ensure dangerous pests and diseases don't arrive in the U.S., but still face some problems in implementing an effective system, said a government watchdog.
"Since September 11, 2001, concerns have persisted about the vulnerability of agriculture to deliberate introduction of foreign pests and disease," said the Government Accountability Office, Congress' watchdog agency, leading to the creating of the Agriculture Quarantine Inspection program.
"The AQI program uses data on arrivals, inspections, and interceptions at U.S. ports of entry to determine how well agriculture inspections identify prohibited materials and to review ports' performance, but data quality issues may prevent AQI program officials from making full use of the data," the GAO said, noting that some of the data was found to be unreliable.
