Datamars Agri has announced that it is collaborating with Dublin-based company Osmonds to promote its tag range to the Irish agricultural market.

Animal health specialist Osmonds, which has an established nationwide presence of on-farm representatives, will introduce the tag range to farmers directly, and show farmers how to use the tags if needed.

Osmonds will not be selling the tags directly; while Osmonds will take orders, farmers will receive their tags from Datamars.

Datamars supplies over 375 million tags per year worldwide, the company claims, and was approved at the start of 2017 by the Department of Agriculture to supply cattle tags into the Irish market.

The companies have announced that they are “proud to work together” to offer farmers a “fast, reliable service”, and tags that preform sample collection in a single step with “high retention rates with the lowest prices for both new sets and replacement tags”.

The Datamars tags currently vie for market share with Mullinahone Co-op and Cormac Tagging, which also received approval to supply tags last year following the opening of the market by the department.

The present market set-up, with three approved tagging manufacturers, will remain in place until December 31 2018; after which the Department of Agriculture will have the option to renew agreements.

Commenting on the matter, Richard Nolan, general manager at Datamars, noted that the arrangement is important to show farmers how the tags, which are still relatively new to the market, work.

At the ‘Ploughing’ I must have closed about 900 tags to show farmers how it works; it’s simple and effective but you need someone on the ground showing people how it’s done.

“The system is used worldwide – and heavily used in Scotland and Northern Ireland – but it’s nice to have someone in front of you, showing you the method,” he said, noting that Osmonds reps could also demonstrate their farm health products to interested farmers.

About Datamars

International giant Datamars has a presence in 97 countries globally and identifies 100 million animals per year. Datamars manufactures and sells identification products for livestock, pets and textiles through sales and production facilities in Europe, the Americas and the Asia-Pacific region.