The Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) is currently inviting tenders for a €90,000 contract to provide a pig movement notification service.
The department published the notification on the government’s eTenders website on Monday (November 27).
It is intended to have the new service fully operational from March 1, 2024.
Pig movement service
According to DAFM, there are approximately 1.6 million pigs are kept in Ireland on some 1,541 registered holdings.
Of those holdings, about 270 would be considered by the department to be commercial units.
Pig keepers are required by law to notify the department, through an outsourced service provider, of all movements of pigs both onto and off their holdings.
This system currently involves a dual notification process where the keeper of the herd from which the pigs are moving must notify the intention to move a batch of pigs and the receiving keeper must confirm receipt of the consignment.
The movement is recorded when notifications are received from both parties involved.
There is one exception to this regulation, data related to pigs brought to a DAFM-approved slaughter plant is recorded directly onto the DAFM system at the slaughter plant.
DAFM noted that such movements are excluded from this tender process.
DAFM
Around 10,500 reconciled pig movements are recorded on an annual basis to and from premises, other than DAFM-approved slaughter plants.
The notifications are made by keepers, dealers, agents and processers in relation to pigs moving from farm-to-farm, farm to local authority abbatoirs, farm to export and from farms to shows.
DAFM said the service it is seeking to procure will handle, process, verify and record these types of pig movements.
The closing date for the receipt of tenders is midday on December 22.