Two weeks after the Agriculture Minister dropped the bombshell that Victoria would “go alone” with an electronic identification (EID) tagging system for the state’s sheep and goat industries, and the people who must make it work in saleyards are “none the wiser” how the system will operate.
This is in spite of the same questions being asked at the half dozen or more industry consultation meetings that have been held in the state.
And these questions are:
- how many times will scanning in saleyards be required?
- will scans be needed for each vendor line or for every sale lot?
- who bears responsibility to perform this around the clock duty? and,
- who bears the cost for its ongoing function?
The fact that the entire system has been implemented in the guise of being in the best interests of national biosecurity is nonsense, says ALPA board member and Hamilton agent Warren Clarke.
If this were the case then all states would have jumped on board to implement the system, Mr Clarke said. “It would give some meaning and clout to the ‘national’ in National Livestock Identification Scheme.”
Another claw that sticks deep in the glut of those expected to swallow this “out of the blue” announcement is that there have been no trials conducted to demonstrate the system will actually work under the cut and thrust of a busy market day, or how costly the system might be to implement, he said.
He said no-one in government had given any consideration to the extra man hours and costs that would be involved to operate the system. Nor, he said, had any thought been given to the delays it may cause for transport drivers and their regulated driving hours. Or indeed to the animal welfare issues that might arise from animals are held -waiting – if post-sale scanning is required.
Mr Clarke said agents at the southwest saleyard meeting opposed the regulation.
“If the government wants, they can either do it or pay to have it done,” he said. “The people of the industry don’t want. There are six or more industry bodies who don’t want it and five other sheep states who don’t want it it either.”
So who is driving it and why? And why did Victoria go alone? he asked.
“Yes, there is money available but no-one knows how much, and what will be the cost.”
Mr Clarke said there were also many unanswered questions about the technology.
“It has never been tested under market conditions,” he said.
“If the EID tagging has been introduced as a safeguard against biosecurity we could understand. But if we have a major biosecurity issue outside of state it won’t exempt Victoria if any export ban were put in place.”
