The Irish Creamery Milk Suppliers’ Association (ICMSA) has called on Minister for Agriculture Martin Heydon to ask Animal Health Ireland (AHI) when the bovine viral diarrhoea (BVD) eradication programme will end.

ICMSA dairy committee chair Noel Murphy has said the issue of BVD is “seemingly never-ending” and farmers were also entitled to know when compulsory tissue tag testing will cease.

“Following on from an adjourned BVD implementation group meeting in October, the members of that group contacted the Minister [for Agriculture] and communicated our conviction that it’s time for some hard questions and straight answers around the funding for a programme that is ongoing for nearly 12 years following an initial voluntary phase during 2012,” said Murphy.

Direction on BVD

The ICMSA dairy committee chair said that it is time for the Minister to publicly tell farmers where Ireland is going in relation to BVD and what the end result will look like.

“BVD testing is costing farmers €13m directly per annum and a further three years of this programme is going to involve an additional €40m directly from the farmers.

The ICMSA rep said he understands that AHI will seek freedom from BVD status this year and there will be a two-year monitoring phase post-2025.

“Who is going to pay for this? Because our members are expressing extreme unwillingness after a decade of paying out.

“Farmers have ordered their tags for 2025, but we are no further on regarding an answer from the Minister.

“Assuming that this seemingly never-ending programme is finally being wound down, we have to reject any more demands for farmers’ money,” he said.

Programme worked

The ICMSA spokesperson acknowledged that the BVD programme had delivered, with the number of persistent infections (PIs) down to 0.02% of all calves tested in 2024. However, he claimed the programme had gone on too long.

“I’m not sure that all the parties appreciate the fact that farmers are no longer willing to finance these endless programmes and just keep on kicking-in to open-ended campaigns.

“The current TB figures stand as a damning indictment of this old strategy and farmers have had enough.

“AHI need[s] to make a commitment as to when compulsory testing is going to end. Most farmers entered the scheme on a voluntary basis in 2012 on the basis of a three-year programme - 13 years later, we are still BVD testing.

“We’ve had enough and we want a timeframe ASAP that maps out the ending of tissue testing and the financing of a winding down or post-2025 monitoring period,” Murphy said.