Northern Ireland cannot eradicate bovine tuberculosis without dealing with its spread through wildlife, the Ulster Farmers' Union (UFU) says in its response to a government consultation, Agriland reports. The union has answered the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (DAERA) consultation on possible wildlife intervention options under the department's Bovine Tuberculosis in Northern Ireland: Blueprint for Eradication.
"Farmers have complied with increasingly stringent cattle controls for decades, yet we are still not making the progress towards eradication that is desperately needed," said UFU deputy president Clement Lynch. "The UFU's position is clear. Wildlife intervention is essential."
Lynch said any intervention had to be evidence-based, practical, affordable and deliverable at the scale required. Research commissioned by the UFU, the Dairy Council for Northern Ireland and the Livestock and Meat Commission puts the indirect cost of the disease to the region's farmers at about 96 million pounds a year; adding DAERA's direct spending, the total is estimated at about 156 million pounds a year.
Behind the figures, he said, are farmers coping with repeated testing, movement restrictions, the loss of productive animals and the stress of herd breakdowns. He urged individual farmers to respond to the consultation themselves.
DAERA's blueprint, published in April last year, describes bovine TB as caused mainly by Mycobacterium bovis, a complex zoonotic disease, meaning it can pass from animals to humans. Primarily a disease of cattle, it also infects a wide range of farm and wild animals. Northern Ireland has had an eradication programme since the late 1950s, and the blueprint says the current programme, required under European law, underpins the ability of its livestock sectors to trade with the EU and internationally.
Photo: Ardfern / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)
Source: Agriland
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