Beef farmers have been slow to join the National Genotyping Programme, according to Teagasc’s head of drystock Pearse Kelly.
He believes the lack of uptake so far is due to a lack of awareness.
On a special beef panel discussion as part of Agriland’s Ploughing livestream earlier today (Thursday, September 21), Pearse encouraged all beef farmers to sign up to the programme.
It saves on costs and time, he said.
Kelly is especially encouraging suckler farmers in the Suckler Carbon Efficiency Programme (SCEP) to sign up for the genotyping programme as he said they’ll have to genotype their farmers anyway.
“Take for argument’s sake a farm who is the new SCEP, if they don’t sign up to the National Genotyping Programme, they’re going to have to wait until next summer to get the genotyping tags sent out to them to tag their calves,” he said.
“Whereas if they’re in the National Genotyping Programme they’ll be able to tag them at birth – that’s a huge cost saving and time saving.
“So I’d encourage all beef farmers, especially suckler farmers who are in SCEP who are going to have to genotype the majority of their calves anyway, to join the genotyping programme.”
National Genotyping Programme
The National Genotyping Programme’s end goal is to have a fully genotyped national herd.
The programme is operated by the Irish Cattle Breeding Federation (ICBF), and based on a cost-sharing model between the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine, the beef and dairy industry and participating farmers.
“Genotyping the national herd will provide a huge opportunity for both the dairy and beef industry accelerate in the rates of gain of our national breeding indexes (e.g. economic breeding index (EBI), Eurostar and Dairy Beef Index (DBI)), which will enhance farm sustainability and reduce carbon emissions,” according to the ICBF.
The programme opened for applications in June.