Veterinary Ireland has resorted to distributing paper-based forms for farm health assessments in the Knowledge Transfer (KT) programme in the absence of an online portal from the Department of Agriculture.

Around 550 vets will receive A4 sheets from Veterinary Ireland this week to use in on-farm risk assessments for herd fertility, parasite control and lameness.

It had been hoped that the Department of Agriculture’s online portal would be up and running by early January.

Portal not ready

However, Conor Geraghty, chair of the food animal committee of Veterinary Ireland, said the online portal was not yet ready and vets were anxious to push on with the work.

“These on-farm assessments are of maximum benefit to farmers when sheep are in sheds and before calving and lambing begins,” he told the Irish Farmers Journal. “We are circulating the paper form to all KT-trained vets – around 550 – this week so that they can start work on the assessments before the peak season of calving and lambing.

“If there are 20,000 farms at two hours each, that’s 40,000 man hours to fit in before the busiest period of the year,” he said.

Pressure is mounting on both farmers and vets to complete all required tasks in year one, with some expressing doubt that the 31 May deadline is feasible.

Knock-on effect

However, any extension of the May deadline would have a knock-on effect on payments to farmers.

A spokesman for the Department said officials are “still working on the online portal and it is expected to be in situ in the near future.”

Latest figures show that 20,252 farmers have applied for the KT scheme.

The majority, some 10,072, are beef farmers, with 4,258 dairy farmers, 4,310 sheep farmers and 885 tillage farmers. There are also 248 poultry farmers and 479 equine farmers.

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