Budget 2015 has been presented to the nation, and while there are many tax incentives for the transfer of land via long term leases, I wonder how much of an advantage this is to farmers in the west of Ireland.

I suspect that active farmers looking for land in the south and east will benefit to a much greater extent than farmers in the west. As many holdings in the west are small and fragmented, obtaining a land block of suitable size on a long term lease will prove difficult for those looking to expand. The vast majority of leases are on a conacre basis at present, and only time will tell if these measures lead to more farmers entering into long term lease arrangements.

Beef Genomics Scheme

While it is disappointing that the new GLAS scheme will not be fully open and operational in 2015, a welcome development is the increased payment under the Beef Genomic Scheme. This scheme has the potential to deliver rapid improvements to the quality of the Irish suckler herd.

While many will argue that we have a top quality suckler herd at present, being able to measure and improve our own herds through improved genomics should deliver similar gains as the EBI has done for dairy herds.

Eurostar

Ireland is leading the way in terms of measuring animal performance and delivering these results via the Eurostar system. Farmers and cattle breeding societies from other countries are coming to Ireland to study our systems and technologies. I suspect there will be a market in the future to live export breeding stock based on their Eurostar values.

ICBF has this week published the latest Eurostar report for suckler herds signed up to Herdplus. Studying my report shows the suckler cows have an average Eurostar maternal value of €149 and five stars within commercial breed. What is more encouraging is cows on their first calving have a maternal value of €188, and also have five stars both within and across beef breeds.

My aim is to improve the overall maternal value of the herd by 20% each year, by using AI bulls with a high maternal value. I concentrate less on the terminal value index as the maternal index includes a number of beef attributes, although I do not ignore the terminal index completely.

Of course there is always a health warning when looking at Eurostar values, due to the low reliability of some of the figures. However, with genomic testing and farmers recording more accurate data, these reliability figures will improve.

ICBF have published a number of studies where data from farms around the country have backed up and proved that four and five star animals out perform one and two star animals, where it counts, in farmers pockets.

With this in mind, I have selected my replacement heifers for breeding into the herd based on both their own performance to date and with a good eye on their Eurostar values. Much like the budget, only time will tell if these animals really are five star animals and will deliver more money in my pocket.