Cattle sector analysed
Sean Bric and his CMMS team have done a good job, with better presentation and content, arriving two months earlier than the initial 2002 edition.
It depends for its accuracy and successful operation on a network of people from the Department of Agriculture to the SWS at Bandon under CEO Kieran Calnan, to every cattle mart, factory, and abattoir, and the 130,000 farmers who breed or keep cattle. For most of them, it involves record keeping, form filling and submitting returns, all at their own expense. It is important therefore that there is a worthwhile report at the end.
Almost every detail of the cattle sector is available from this report, which may be viewed on the Department of Agriculture’s www.agriculture.gov.ie website.
It shows that 16% of calves are born on farms in Co Cork, where 76% are dairy farms, in stark contrast to Co Leitrim, for example, where only 1.5% of calf births occur, and only 8% of them are from dairy herds.
Movement through marts continues to account for 1.46m head, with the bovine traffic peaking in April and October, but declining 1% overall from last year.
The CMMS should become a vital planning tool for the cattle sector, but constant improvement in the information flow is needed.
There is no reason why an earlier publication date should not be targeted.
A quarterly information sheet should also be considered, but meantime, congratulations on a job well done.
