The Irish Farmers’ Association (IFA) has called on Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine Charlie McConalogue to outline his position on the National Bovine Tuberculosis (TB) Eradication Programme.
The association’s animal health committee chair, TJ Maher made the comments following an update provided by the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) to the TB Implementation Group today (Tuesday, September 3).
Maher said that TB Reactor numbers are set to escalate as Minister McConalogue reduces staff resources in national eradication programme for the disease.
“We are going to lose up to 10,000 more productive animals from our farms this year with reactor numbers predicted to hit 40,000.
“Over 700 more farmers to-date or 5.5% of herds have had their farms restricted, while in the same period the Wildlife Control Programme have only dealt with an extra 200 badgers,” Maher said.
TB
The IFA Animal Health chair said that DAFM confirmed the Wildlife Control Programme is losing eight full time staff as a result of the government moratorium on recruitment in the public service.
He said that no figures were available for the broader impact of this moratorium on the staff resources across the veterinary and technical officer levels in the TB programme.
“These are critical areas in investigating and resolving TB breakdowns and ensuring timely removal of reactors which are vital if we are to get TB numbers under control,” he said.
Maher has called on Minister McConalogue and his government colleagues to make a statement on the matter.
“Are they really serious about eradicating the disease or are they just content with paying lip service to the problem?
“Reducing key resources in the programme will leave farmers to endure the trauma and financial impact of TB breakdowns. Actions from the minister and his government colleagues is what farmers need to see.
“We must have a fully-resourced Wildlife Control Programme based on density reduction with full veterinary and technical officer staff complements to investigate TB breakdowns and ensure the timely removal of reactors,” he said.