Heydon 'must provide TB proposals' before emergency meeting
Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine Martin Heydon has been called on to provide draft proposals for addressing the upward trends in TB figures before an emergency meeting taking place next week.
The minister announced this week that he is bringing together key stakeholders to a meeting next Thursday (May 8) to discuss a reset of the TB Eradication Programme, aimed at addressing deteriorating TB disease levels.
Ahead of that meeting, the Irish Farmers' Association (IFA) has called on the minister to outline his proposals to stakeholders in advance of the meeting.
According to IFA president Francie Gorman, the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine committed to providing stakeholders with its proposals and "the rationale behind them".
Gorman said the department gave this commitment at a meeting of the TB Stakeholder Forum on March 26.
As Agriland reported on that date, over 20 measures were put forward by department officials at the TB forum meeting. It is unclear at this time how many of those measures will be discussed at next week's extraordinary meeting.
Gorman said today (Friday, May 2) that the specific proposals to be discussed next week have not been provided; nor has the department provided observations on proposals made by the IFA, which Gorman claimed the department also committed to doing.
He said the IFA submitted a set of "proposed enhancements" to the TB programme measures at the end of February.
"TB is causing enormous financial and psychological pressure on farms and must be addressed. Issuing an invitation to a summit out of the blue at a week's notice with no details on what will be discussed, and no draft documents, looks like a poorly thought-out PR stunt," Gorman commented.
"The minister was able to brief media about his summit before he even sent the invitation to the stakeholders, yet he is unwilling to provide any details of the measures to be discussed on the day. This shouldn't be about spin or choreography from the minister. TB is deadly serious and it is costing farmers' millions," he added.
