Angus Australia, the country's largest seedstock breed society, has challenged Meat & Livestock Australia (MLA) over its plan for a national multi-breed genetic evaluation, which would rank cattle across breeds, reports Jon Condon for Beef Central.
In an email to members, chief executive Scott Wright said the society's concern was "not principally about the science, but rather how such an evaluation might ultimately be commercialised and what that could mean for registered seedstock producers". In particular, he said, it has sought clarity on whether commercial genomic DNA testing companies could deliver breeding values, and whether high-accuracy breeding values could one day be marketed for unregistered or composite cattle outside breed society systems.
Registered breeders, he said, have spent heavily for more than 30 years on pedigree recording, performance measurement and genomic testing. "We believe it is reasonable to ask whether a new commercial evaluation model could allow others to benefit from that accumulated investment without making equivalent contributions," he wrote, adding that this was not a claim that MLA had adopted such a model.
Angus Australia has asked MLA for a comprehensive business case covering commercialisation, governance and the effect on registered breeders, and says its questions have not yet been adequately answered. MLA has also asked for data from earlier projects of the Angus Sire Benchmarking Program, a research programme funded by both bodies, for use in its evaluation. MLA told Beef Central it has consulted widely, and some expect announcements at its annual general meeting in Townsville on 24 November.
Meanwhile the society is developing Angus GenetiQ, its own Angus-specific genetic evaluation, which Wright said was set out in its five-year strategic plan and is not a reaction to MLA. No decision has been made to replace BreedPlan with it, he said, but it gives the society "a genuine alternative". Results of a member survey on the MLA proposal are due next week.
Photo: Sallicio / Wikimedia Commons (public domain)
Source: Beef Central
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