Tighter animal movement restrictions and a more stringent testing regime announced in the long-awaited TB Action Plan have sparked serious unease among farmers this week.
The absence of any new or additional compensation funding in the new programme has heightened farmer concerns.
Among the measures in the plan launched by Minister for Agriculture Martin Heydon this week is a ban on the sale of cows from TB-restricted herds to other farms for two years. This lockdown period starts after the removal of the last reactor.
Mandatory blood testing will be required in breeding herds of 80 cows or more where at least 5% of the herd tests positive.
Pre-movement testing in and out of some contract-rearing farms has also been introduced.
Female cattle over 18 months which have been exposed to a high-risk breakdown in the past will also be publicly identified on mart boards on sale days.
Additionally, high-risk herds which suffer a TB relapse will require testing at six-monthly intervals for three years.
Compensation
Minister Heydon claimed that spending on the TB programme had grown “exponentially” in recent years and finances were too stretched to justify an increase in compensation payments to farmers. The cost of the TB programme has ballooned from €35m in 2018 to €101m last year, he said.
“That is why, ultimately here, we need to make the investment now to save the cost that there is on farmers and the Exchequer,” he maintained.
IFA president Francie Gorman said existing TB compensation caps needed to be increased given buoyant cattle prices, while ICMSA president Denis Drennan criticised the plans as “very firm on farmers” but “very flimsy on everyone else”.
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