Split support for eID

There was a clear rift between commercial and studs operators use of eID with farmers arguing that the cost and increased labour demand maintaining the database outweighed the benefits of the livestock traceability technology.

"eID will be a nightmare to manage and keeping the database up-to-date will get way out of control," Nareen Station manger Grant Little said to the 130-strong crowd.

Nareen Station and its sister property Barrama operates a 22,000 Merino ewe flock, which station owner Gordon Dickinson said meant that investing in eID was logistically and feasibly unrealistic.

"If people want to use eID then that is great, but we would not get the value out of it," Mr Dickinson said.

"I think it is insane to enforce it on the industry and it is a good example of a naive, well-intentioned bureaucratic system that is being forced on the industry."

His comments were met with a round of applause by the attendees including Hay Merino Breeders president Graham Morphett who said it was understandable some studs and commercial operations used eID for management purposes, however emphasised "it must remain a voluntary not mandatory system".

The ongoing debate has escalated as the Department of Environment and Primary Industry pushes to improve the National Livestock Identification System that monitors mob-based movement with a new system that would require the mandatory electronic tagging of all individual sheep.

However, Australian Lamb Company livestock manager Ben Verrall said the implementation of the eID would be driven from the American and European markets and would force producers to participate or potentially lose major trade partners.

"If the EU or America say they need this information, we either don't supply them or we do it - logistically that will be the main driver," Mr Verrall said.

"I am am not saying it will be tomorrow, but if they get aggressive on it, we will have to toe the line or not sell to that market, but thankfully it hasn't come to that yet."

Mr Verrall said a positive for farmers investing in eID would be improved monitoring of their flock's weight-gains, while consumers and processors benefited from the improved traceability.

"Any tools we can get with traceability, to help find the best livestock out there, we will take those tools and implement those systems so if eID will help us then we will go with it," he said.

"We are already half doing it now with the NLIS, but having fully-traceable livestock will eventually come in, but it will be the EU and America, or any country that requires it from us, that will see it eventually enforced."

Contributing to the debate was Chrome Sheep Stud principal Matthew Tonissen, who questioned whether Nareen Station used information derived from the use of eID in tracing the livestock history when buying from a stud.

Mr Dickinson said yes, "to some extent, but we need a person looking deep into the animal too".

Mr Tonissen is a supporter of eID and has been electronic tagging replacement sheep and stud ewes since 2011.

"The manual system of (recording information) is open to human error, it's labour intensive and it is a mob-based system" he said.

"Once we went eID we minimised labour, it was more cost effective and we were able to record the information we were already recording, but much more and effectively because it is individually tailored so you can look up the history of that animal and find out what it has been doing."

Mr Tonissen said while eID was a hot-topic for commercial producers, there were strong benefits to the investment.

"The advantages that I can see is that initially you can track different sire groups and bloodlines, weight gain on individuals and especially for lamb feedlots and finishing systems. I believe it is an absolute no-brainer ... provided you have scale to justify the cost," he said.

"Even supplementary feeding can benefit - splitting them into their weight ranges so they are competing with peers of the same weight range for the feed."