The Irish Cattle Breeding Federation (ICBF) is to double the number of updates to EBI and €uro-Star figures in a year from three to six. The bi-monthly updates will commence in January 2019.

Explaining the decision to increase the number of updates, ICBF’s Dr Francis Kearney said the group aims to reduce average potential changes to an animal’s index.

“As the volumes of data being included in each evaluation will be less, it is anticipated that the average potential changes to an animal's index based on new data will be reduced compared to the current schedule."

Daily data

In a statement, ICBF said it receives data on a daily basis that could inform genetic evaluations. This data, they said, could be used to increase the reliability of the EBI and €uro-Stars and better inform breeding decisions.

However, at present the data is only incorporated into evaluations every four months. ICBF said farmers expect to see information reflected in the indexes of their animals as quickly as possible.

Traditionally, updates have been carried out in April, August and December. Genetic evaluations will now be published in January, March, May, July, September and November.

The new genetic evaluation publication dates for 2019 and cut-off dates for submission of data and genotype samples are available to view on the ICBF website.