Teagasc held its annual national beef conference on Monday night, in the form of a two part online session.
Teagasc had hoped to hold the national beef conference in Claremorris in front of a live audience, but the recent spike in COVID-19 cases meant it had to revert to the online offering for another year.
It was Professor Frank O’Mara’s first beef conference as director and he addressed the viewers about the issue of climate change policy, how it will affect farmers and how Teagasc as an organisation will help farmers through this time of change.
“We were delighted to launch our new ‘Future Beef’ programme this week. This will see 24 suckler farms work with specialist Teagasc advisers as part of our Signpost programme over the next few years.
“This programme will be central to our work in demonstrating to farmers technologies that will increase efficiency on their farms and help their bottom line, but also help us meet the country’s targets on greenhouse gas emissions by 2030.”
The Teagasc director went on to outline what our national targets were, with a particular focus on agriculture.
We cannot afford to ignore it as an industry
“Climate change is central to our licence to farm and it’s also becoming increasingly important in the markets for our produce. We cannot afford to ignore it as an industry. While the Government plan is to reduce emissions by 51% by 2030, agriculture has been tasked with decreasing emissions by between 22-30% by 2030. If we look at the electricity sector, they must reduce emissions by between 62-81% by 2030.”
Agriculture emissions stood at 23m tonnes of CO2 equivalent in 2018.
The target for 2030 is 16-18m tonnes of CO2 equivalents. This means a reduction of 5-7m tonnes is required
On livestock farms, livestock are the main contributor to emissions, with methane being expelled through the natural digestive system of the cow, nitrous oxide emissions from fertiliser and methane and nitrous oxide emissions from slurry produced on these farms.
The target for 2030 is 16-18m tonnes of CO2 equivalents. This means a reduction of 5-7m tonnes is required. This is a major challenge, given the fact that agriculture emissions have been increasing in recent years.
Cattle having methane emissions measured at the ICBF progeny test centre in Tully, Co Kildare. \ Thomas Hubert
National herd reduction
Prof O’Mara said: “While there has been a lot of talk around cutting the national herd in recent weeks and months, Teagasc is of the firm belief that a lot of what is needed from the industry can come from technology adoption on farms and efficiency gains without the need to cut the national herd.”
The Teagasc Marginal Abatement Cost Curve (MACC) will be central to this. This graph includes all the technologies, old and new, including switching from CAN to protected urea, low emission slurry spreading, higher EBI and Eurostar values, etc.
Further down the road, we should be able to reduce 1-2m tonnes by implementing technologies like feed additives, new fertilisers and earlier slaughter age
“We can reduce emissions by 2m tonnes very quickly by adopting the simple technologies in the MACC. Further down the road, we should be able to reduce 1-2m tonnes by implementing technologies like feed additives, new fertilisers and earlier slaughter age.
“The final step will be to hopefully implement technologies that are in the early stage of research at the moment, but will be available for industry use by 2030. These include feed additives at pasture and breeding low emitting animals.
“These should take off another 1.5-3m tonnes. Teagasc, through its Signpost, Future Beef and Dairy Beef 500 programmes will be helping farmers make these changes and adopt technologies like grass measuring, breeding, animal health, changing fertiliser use, establishing clover swards, increasing soil fertility and slaughtering animals earlier over the next few years.”
Commercial Beef Value (CBV) launched
ICBF used the beef conference as an opportunity to launch its new Commercial Beef Value (CBV) Index. This index has been designed to help people buying dairy beef calves, weanlings and store cattle to aid them decide which animal would leave more money when purchased.
There are over 23,000 rearing herds in Ireland who purchase animals at various stages and bring them through to store or slaughter stage. At the moment, these farmers don’t have an index to use to determine the genetic potential of that animal.
While the dairy beef index and the terminal index could be used, they both include calving traits, and as these farmers are not calving cows, they are not concerned with the calving traits. The new beef index is essentially the terminal index with the calving traits removed.
We have done testing on this over the last few months and higher CBV animals will deliver higher value carcases
Animals will be ranked across breeds, but also within three breed types; dairy x dairy, dairy beef and suckler animals, all suckler animals which haven’t calved, all dairy x dairy male animals and all dairy beef animals. These indexes will be displayed on all online reports and will also be displayed on mart boards early in the New Year.
Chris Daly, ICBF, said: “We have done testing on this over the last few months and higher CBV animals will deliver higher value carcases.”
The biggest challenge with the new index will be to get more dairy beef calves registered with a sire. Without that, the new index will be of little benefit. Without a sire, the animal won’t have a CBV.
Irish agriculture has to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions from 23m tonnes in 2018 to 16-18m tonnes by 2030.Teagasc director Frank O’Mara says a cut to the national herd won’t be necessary if we get widespread adoption of technologies in the Teagasc MACC.The new Teagasc Signpost programme, which includes over 100 demo farms, will be central in getting farmers to adopt these technologies.Current research on feed additives looks positive, but will take time to roll out to farms.The Commercial Beef Value (CBV) index has been launched by ICBF to aid farmers trading in animals to determine their genetic potential. It is essentially the terminal index with the calving traits taken out.The CBV will be displayed on mart boards in early 2022.An animal must have a sire to get a CBV index.
Teagasc held its annual national beef conference on Monday night, in the form of a two part online session.
Teagasc had hoped to hold the national beef conference in Claremorris in front of a live audience, but the recent spike in COVID-19 cases meant it had to revert to the online offering for another year.
It was Professor Frank O’Mara’s first beef conference as director and he addressed the viewers about the issue of climate change policy, how it will affect farmers and how Teagasc as an organisation will help farmers through this time of change.
“We were delighted to launch our new ‘Future Beef’ programme this week. This will see 24 suckler farms work with specialist Teagasc advisers as part of our Signpost programme over the next few years.
“This programme will be central to our work in demonstrating to farmers technologies that will increase efficiency on their farms and help their bottom line, but also help us meet the country’s targets on greenhouse gas emissions by 2030.”
The Teagasc director went on to outline what our national targets were, with a particular focus on agriculture.
We cannot afford to ignore it as an industry
“Climate change is central to our licence to farm and it’s also becoming increasingly important in the markets for our produce. We cannot afford to ignore it as an industry. While the Government plan is to reduce emissions by 51% by 2030, agriculture has been tasked with decreasing emissions by between 22-30% by 2030. If we look at the electricity sector, they must reduce emissions by between 62-81% by 2030.”
Agriculture emissions stood at 23m tonnes of CO2 equivalent in 2018.
The target for 2030 is 16-18m tonnes of CO2 equivalents. This means a reduction of 5-7m tonnes is required
On livestock farms, livestock are the main contributor to emissions, with methane being expelled through the natural digestive system of the cow, nitrous oxide emissions from fertiliser and methane and nitrous oxide emissions from slurry produced on these farms.
The target for 2030 is 16-18m tonnes of CO2 equivalents. This means a reduction of 5-7m tonnes is required. This is a major challenge, given the fact that agriculture emissions have been increasing in recent years.
Cattle having methane emissions measured at the ICBF progeny test centre in Tully, Co Kildare. \ Thomas Hubert
National herd reduction
Prof O’Mara said: “While there has been a lot of talk around cutting the national herd in recent weeks and months, Teagasc is of the firm belief that a lot of what is needed from the industry can come from technology adoption on farms and efficiency gains without the need to cut the national herd.”
The Teagasc Marginal Abatement Cost Curve (MACC) will be central to this. This graph includes all the technologies, old and new, including switching from CAN to protected urea, low emission slurry spreading, higher EBI and Eurostar values, etc.
Further down the road, we should be able to reduce 1-2m tonnes by implementing technologies like feed additives, new fertilisers and earlier slaughter age
“We can reduce emissions by 2m tonnes very quickly by adopting the simple technologies in the MACC. Further down the road, we should be able to reduce 1-2m tonnes by implementing technologies like feed additives, new fertilisers and earlier slaughter age.
“The final step will be to hopefully implement technologies that are in the early stage of research at the moment, but will be available for industry use by 2030. These include feed additives at pasture and breeding low emitting animals.
“These should take off another 1.5-3m tonnes. Teagasc, through its Signpost, Future Beef and Dairy Beef 500 programmes will be helping farmers make these changes and adopt technologies like grass measuring, breeding, animal health, changing fertiliser use, establishing clover swards, increasing soil fertility and slaughtering animals earlier over the next few years.”
Commercial Beef Value (CBV) launched
ICBF used the beef conference as an opportunity to launch its new Commercial Beef Value (CBV) Index. This index has been designed to help people buying dairy beef calves, weanlings and store cattle to aid them decide which animal would leave more money when purchased.
There are over 23,000 rearing herds in Ireland who purchase animals at various stages and bring them through to store or slaughter stage. At the moment, these farmers don’t have an index to use to determine the genetic potential of that animal.
While the dairy beef index and the terminal index could be used, they both include calving traits, and as these farmers are not calving cows, they are not concerned with the calving traits. The new beef index is essentially the terminal index with the calving traits removed.
We have done testing on this over the last few months and higher CBV animals will deliver higher value carcases
Animals will be ranked across breeds, but also within three breed types; dairy x dairy, dairy beef and suckler animals, all suckler animals which haven’t calved, all dairy x dairy male animals and all dairy beef animals. These indexes will be displayed on all online reports and will also be displayed on mart boards early in the New Year.
Chris Daly, ICBF, said: “We have done testing on this over the last few months and higher CBV animals will deliver higher value carcases.”
The biggest challenge with the new index will be to get more dairy beef calves registered with a sire. Without that, the new index will be of little benefit. Without a sire, the animal won’t have a CBV.
Irish agriculture has to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions from 23m tonnes in 2018 to 16-18m tonnes by 2030.Teagasc director Frank O’Mara says a cut to the national herd won’t be necessary if we get widespread adoption of technologies in the Teagasc MACC.The new Teagasc Signpost programme, which includes over 100 demo farms, will be central in getting farmers to adopt these technologies.Current research on feed additives looks positive, but will take time to roll out to farms.The Commercial Beef Value (CBV) index has been launched by ICBF to aid farmers trading in animals to determine their genetic potential. It is essentially the terminal index with the calving traits taken out.The CBV will be displayed on mart boards in early 2022.An animal must have a sire to get a CBV index. 
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