Farmers have been reminded if they wish to avail of the various Aberdeen Angus quality beef programmes that only calves born to pedigree sires will be eligible for the schemes.
The Aberdeen Angus Cattle Society’s president, Alan Cheney, has outlined: “A lot of work has gone in to genetically fingerprinting every pedigree Aberdeen Angus sire in Ireland.
“Since January 2019, all Aberdeen Angus bulls submitted for registration to the society must be genetically identified prior to the actual registration process itself taking place.
These developments will require meat plants to take a tissue sample from animals submitted for slaughter to have this DNA-tested.
Cheney explained this is “in order to verify if their sires were, or were not, pedigree Aberdeen Angus bulls”.
“The meat plants involved in all the Aberdeen Angus quality beef schemes and the supermarkets are totally committed to using the sire database in this way.
“This means that all the calves born this year will be subject to this testing procedure at point of slaughter.
The current Aberdeen Angus quality bonuses are worth up to an additional 20c/kg or approximately €60 per carcass on all in-spec animals.
“All the meat plants will continue to visually assess cattle submitted for the Aberdeen Angus schemes.”
Cheney pointed out the many challenges faced by Irish beef producers over recent months.
Concluding, he reiterated: “Farmers need to get every euro they can from the market. One way of doing this is to qualify for the various Aberdeen Angus quality beef schemes.
“But, looking to the future, this can only be assured if producers are working with stock sired by pedigree Aberdeen Angus bulls.”