Mullinahone Co-op has said that the amount of farmers ringing to see where their tags are at this point is starting to reduce, as the co-op catches up on orders.

Issues around tag delays, broken tags and phone wait times as long as 45 minutes have been raised by farmers in recent days.

Niamh Bambrick of Mullinahone Co-op told the Irish Farmers Journal on Tuesday that delays were due to the “big influx of orders in that early January period”.

“There’s a delay coming in of any new tags from our suppliers Allflex. Us or them couldn’t foresee the amount of farmers that actually waited until the first two weeks of January to order their calf tags,” Bambrick said.

However, she said that tags which have been ordered last week and the week before are now arriving into Mullinahone and going out to farmers.

With regard to replacement tags, those that are ordered “today” arrive on farm “tomorrow”, she said. Bambrick said that there is a slight delay to DNA button tags due to increased demand on the back of the National Genotyping Programme.

“There’s a delay in them coming back to the farmer from the labs, and farmers have to ring and order them again. That’s more of a piece for ICBF to answer to.

"Obviously it’s having a knock on affect on our business, farmers are calling to order more button tags than they usually would,” she said.