Number of cows in the period fell by 1.3 per cent, to 2.6 million animals and pig numbers were down by 4.4 per cent, to 7.5 million animals.

The number of sheep and goats over the period grew by 0.3 per cent, to 2.13 million animals.

The State Statistics Service said that processing companies in the first quarter of 2012 obtained 356,100 tonnes of cattle and poultry, which was 1 per cent down year-over-year, as well as 957,800 tonnes of milk and diary products, a rise of 9 per cent year-over-year.

The share of private households of total purchase of cattle and poultry over the period fell from 7.3 per cent to 6.3 per cent, and that for milk – from 45 per cent to 37.9 per cent. Processing companies used 250,500 tonnes of own cattle and poultry (a fall of 1 per cent year-over-year) and 2,500 tonnes of own milk, a rise of 48 per cent.

As reported, the number of cattle in Ukraine as of 1 January 2012 was 4.47 million animals, which was 0.5 per cent down year-on-year. The number of cows in the period fell by 1.6 per cent, to 2.62 million animals, pig numbers were down by 6.1 per cent, to 7.47 million animals, while poultry numbers were down by 2.1 per cent, to 199.5 million birds. The number of sheep and goats over the period grew by 0.5 per cent, to 1.74 million animals.

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The world’s population currently consumes 37 million tonnes of dairy products, 65 million tonnes of beef, and 13 million tonnes of sheep meat annually. This is expected to grow in line with population expansion.

Food safety and the human health effects of food are currently high priority for consumers. Breeding for improved product quality, in combination with optimised production and processing regimes, is one approach that will help the Irish dairy and meat sectors ensure animal products of consistently high quality and nutritive value are available.

A recently awarded project, BreedQuality, will use state-of-the-art tools to develop phenotypic, genetic and genomic approaches for a national strategy to improve the quality and consistency of milk and meat products from Irish cattle and sheep.

Dr Donagh Berry, Teagasc Animal & Grassland Research and Innovation Centre, Moorepark, explains: “To achieve consistency in quality, the underlying meaning of quality to consumers must be described, understood and translated into technical specifications at each stage within the supply chain.

In other words, the determinants of superior quality must first be identified from a marketplace perspective and then explored from a technical standpoint. The first task of the BreedQuality project will be to document the relative importance of quality attributes in delivering consumer and customer satisfaction and this will help guide the focus of the ‘breeding for quality’ research.”

Current Status of Breeding for Quality in Ireland

Product quality is traditionally laborious and costly to measure, hindering the routine capture of such information. Therefore, product quality is one of the suites of traits largely neglected from the national breeding strategies in dairy, beef and sheep in Ireland.

The task on milk quality in the BreedQuality project builds on recently completed research by Teagasc in the EU-funded project, RobustMilk (http://www.robustmilk.eu). Several methods are currently being explored to develop rapid, low-cost, approaches to routinely assess milk quality. We envisage that within three years Ireland will have implemented a world-class and potentially world-first national breeding strategy for milk quality parameters.

Like milk quality, breeding for improved meat quality is hampered primarily by the challenges of routine low-cost measurements of meat quality. However, unlike for milk, individual meat samples are not currently subjected to technologies that can be readily exploited to measure detailed meat quality components.

“Research at Teagasc and elsewhere, nevertheless, suggests various secondary methods such as near infra-red spectroscopy could potentially be useful to predict meat quality characteristics, particularly colour, drip loss, fat content and fatty acid composition,” says Dr Berry.

Near infra-red spectroscopy exploits information generated in this region of the electromagnetic spectrum and is amenable to online measurement. Recent Teagasc, UCD and international research has also shown that other tools, such as image analysis, including hyperspectral imaging, computed tomography and Raman spectroscopy are also capable of predicting important aspects of fresh meat quality.

Combining Resources and Knowledge

Routine access to large quantities of low-cost, accurate phenotypes, irrespective of the trait, will remain of fundamental importance in animal breeding (and management) for at least many decades.

The BreedQuality project, involving animal scientists, milk and meat scientists, molecular and quantitative geneticists, market researchers and industry, will combine resources and knowledge to produce a set of close-to-implementation tools and algorithms that will result in the implementation of market-based national breeding strategies for improved milk and meat quality.

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Carstairs Mains, a mixed livestock and arable farm, is part of the network of Quality Meat Scotland (QMS) monitor farms throughout Scotland.

Calf pneumonia had been an on-going problem for Mr Baillie, who bull-beefs all the bull calves born in his 75 head suckler herd, along with an additional 120 dairy bull calves, purchased at approximately ten weeks old, from two local dairy farms.

To give the dairy calves protection against the most common viruses and bacteria which cause pneumonia, they are double-vaccinated on their farms of origin, with a combined viral and bacterial vaccine.

Nevertheless, pneumonia had been acknowledged by Mr Baillie to be suppressing the performance of the young bulls, as well as being the cause of mortalities.

Calf pneumonia had been discussed at the December (2012) monitor farm meeting. Farm vet Charles Marwood of the Clyde Vet Group had told the group: “The maintenance of a supply of fresh air lessens the risk of pneumonia. Air quality is important and good ventilation helps to prevent the build up of humidity caused by vapour from the stock, dung, bedding and water spillage.”

By igniting smoke bombs amongst the housed cattle, Mr Marwood had illustrated the air movement within the buildings, while explaining “the ideal situation is for the smoke to disperse through the building’s roof within two minutes.”

After observing the behaviour of the smoke, the group had promptly suggested that Mr Baillie should remove the roof ridging from the main finishing building.

A few days later the roof ridging was off.

At the recent meeting, Mr Baillie updated the group. “Within minutes of the roof ridge being opened up, I walked into the shed and straight away the air quality had noticeably improved - an almost unbelievable, instantly better atmosphere, at virtually no cost!”

Also, after heeding comments from the group at the December meeting, Mr Baillie had put Secure Cover Windbreak curtains along what was an open-sided building, where young calves were housed. At the December meeting the group, supported by vet Charles Marwood, had felt that the open, south facing side, had left the calves too vulnerable to chilling, winter winds.

“I considered Yorkshire boarding which would have cost around £1,200 plus several days work to put up,” explained Mr Baillie. “But decided on the curtains, which were a couple of hundred pounds cheaper and only took a few hours to erect. Also each curtain covers one bay, and can individually be rolled up, fully or partially, as the weather changes.”

At the December meeting the youngest calves had been in the then open-sided building. “As a temporary measure, the recent new intake groups have gone into the warmer, main building, with batches of older calves currently being penned in the building with the windbreak curtains. Both groups are clearly thriving and content,” said Mr Baillie.

“Since making these simple changes to the buildings, the health of the young bulls is noticeably better, and there’s been no pneumonia in the most recent intake of dairy calves, a welcome improvement on previous batches.”

Mr Baillie electronically tags his bulls and monitors individual liveweight gain with fortnightly weighings.

“It will be interesting to compare the performance, right through to slaughter, of previous batches of bulls, against the batches which have arrived since the changes were made to the buildings,” remarked Mr Baillie.

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The results of Dow Jones’ prereport survey of analysts appear at right. There were ten respondents to this month’s survey.

After just one month of higher year-on-year numbers, placements (which were 2 per cent larger than last year in January) are expected to again fall significantly short of year-ago levels. The sell-off in Live Cattle futures certainly cooled interest in placing cattle in February — and has continued that pattern so far in March. Add in the prospect of very tight grain supplies and the potential for explosive prices and one can see quickly why placements would fall. PLUS — the feeder cattle supply is still tight. With little margin available, feeders have had to be pretty disciplined and analysts expect that to show up in lower placements numbers in Friday’s report.

Steer and heifer slaughter during February 2013, according to daily slaughter estimates from USDA, numbered 1.799 million head, 91.5 per cent of the level of one year ago — a pretty comparable number to the 92.7 per cent average estimate for February marketings. The year’s February did have one less weekday than did last year’s leap month and adjusting for that difference would put this year’s slaughter at 95.9 per cent of last year. We believe that survey respondents simply compare this year to last, however, since that is how the question is posed. USDA does not adjust numbers for slaughter or business day differentials.

If the 93.5 per cent average of the estimates for March 1 feedlot inventories is accurate, it would put inventories at 10.918 million head, 759,000 FEWER than one year ago. That is the largest year-on-year decline recorded in this most recent reduction cycle. Inventories were 738,000 lower on February 1 and have been at least 635,000 smaller than one year earlier since November.

The carnage in the protein markets continues this week with both Live Cattle and Lean Hogs futures losing another $2 to $3/cwt since last Thursday. Cash hog markets have dipped below $80/cwt. and cattle are treading water almost equal to last year’s prices with last week’s 5-market average being $126.66 versus $126.45 one year earlier.

There is a bit of encouraging news from the beef packing sector, however, where margins have improved in recent weeks. Beef packer gross margins got back near the 5-year average of about $130/ head the week of March 9 and, if grading percentages and by-product values remained constant last week (which is assumed in the chart at right), will be above the 5-year average last week, the first time that has happened since September. Regardless of whether you like or deride the idea of “trickle-down economics,” the beef and pork businesses are perfect examples in that producer-level demand is derived from wholesale demand which is, ultimately, derived from consumerlevel demand. We think the challenges of late have been primarily at the wholesale level and the increase in cutout values and, consequently, packer margins will have a positive impact on cattle prices soon. But cattle price increases will not likely run ahead of cutout values.

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Feedlot margins remain negative. Cash cattle prices averaged about the same in February as in January ($125). Concern over exports to Russia and China deterred placements. Cattle placed in February will be marketed from July through October.

Allendale anticipates a marketing total 7.5 per cent lower than February of 2012. This is made after a 4.8 per cent decrease due to a calendar adjustment, one less weekday in 2013 vs. 2012, for this month.

Total Cattle on Feed as of March 1 will be 7.1 per cent lower than last year. This is smaller than the February 1 survey which showed 6.2 per cent fewer cattle. Months of lower placements, and tightening feedlot numbers, are now translating into lower slaughter levels.

Allendale projects a 640 million lb. total pork stock level for the end of February. The five year average is 590 million lbs. for the end of February. Allendale's estimate represents an increase of 34 million lbs. from the previous month.The five year average month to month change for February is for a 30 million lb. decrease.

Beef stocks, at 489 million lbs., are above the five year average of 441. This month's number represents a 5 million lb. increase from the previous month. The five-year average change is for a 16 million lb. decrease.

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The BPEX knowledge transfer team is working with pig recording analyst Sanne Baden and six different pig producers on the project, as part of the ‘Breed +3’ initiative to help each herd wean an extra three pigs per sow per year.

The 2TS Recording Project will run for the rest of 2013, with the first farm visits by Sanne now complete. The herds range in size from 250 to 750 sows and include both indoor and outdoor units.

Plans producers have made after their initial discussions include: 1) measuring the impact of different genetics through the system 2) reducing the number of non-productive days by scanning twice and using boars to check for heat and 3) recording causes of death in the farrowing house to help pinpoint associations with higher than normal pre-weaning mortality rates.

BPEX knowledge transfer manager, Charlotte West, says: “Herd performance recording and spending time understanding trends and patterns in the data helps pinpoint which changes could make the biggest difference to pig performance and cutting costs. It also helps establish what information is most useful to observe on a weekly, monthly and quarterly basis. All businesses, including the top performers, can benefit.”

Sanne will make three more quarterly visits to see how things are going and make further recommendations. All producers involved in the project will be discussing their progress at local Pig Club meetings.

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From the outset, students were keen to speak to one another, particularly those working in similar fields.

The supremacy of face-to-face communication can be seen at events such as this where synergies are generated and deep connections made that would never arise via electronic channels.

The event was also an excellent opportunity for Program Managers to catch up with postgraduate students working in their program areas.

Following a welcome dinner, the first full day commenced with Poultry CRC CEO Professor Mingan Choct speaking about leadership. He showed how a leader should work to achieve effective collaboration and innovation.

Drawing from years of experience, he advised the audience that the best way forward in any given field is to seek out the ‘best people’ residing in that field, globally.

He listed key points to remember when forming an effective team, and spoke of the importance of carefully managing multiple personalities.

Professor Choct believes that “effective collaboration should lead to an enhancement of both parties’ capabilities and not an ‘averaging out’, which lowers the overall effectiveness and impact of the collaboration."

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NFU President Peter Kendall said: “As always, we will examine the details in the coming days to get a much clearer picture of how this budget will help farming become more profitable and productive. But some of the specific announcements are to be welcomed.

“New employment allowance to cut national insurance bills by £2,000 for every firm will benefit around 40,000 farm businesses in England and Wales that employ farm workers.

“The cancellation of the fuel duty rise in September will help businesses across the economy, including food and farming industries that have been struggling to absorb rising fuel costs.

“I’m pleased to see the Government doing all it can to help the beer industry and in abolishing the beer tax escalator, the Chancellor’s demonstrated the huge importance of the beer industry to our rural economy; every one job in brewing supports a further job in agriculture.

“And measures that could create a more competitive business environment in the UK are a positive step. In particular, news that the Government is committing over £1.6bn during the next ten years to its’ Industrial Strategy.

"This includes £500m for sectors where the UK has a comparative global advantage, including agricultural technology, with the aim of meeting the challenge of harnessing agricultural science to achieve sustainable improvement of agriculture in the UK and overseas.

“However, I am disappointed to have heard so little from the Chancellor that will give our farmers and growers the confidence they need to invest in their businesses. The UK agri-food has some tremendous opportunities ahead. Globally, demand for food is growing, stimulating further potential for exports beyond the EU.

"At home, there remains an opportunity to expand our share of domestic markets as we witness unprecedented levels of awareness of food provenance and origin in the wake of the horsemeat scandal.

"Last year’s Autumn Statement contained the welcome announcement on the Annual Investment Allowance, and this is already encouraging plant and machinery expenditure in agriculture. This budget failed to deliver equivalent measures for farm buildings and infrastructure. It is capital investment which is the real trigger for meeting the long term challenge of food security.”

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With the help of Defra, EU and Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) funding a model midge species has been identified which scientist say enables transmission studies, aiding further research into the Schmallenberg virus.

As part of the project, Dr Eva Veronesi demonstrated that a colony line of midges maintained at The Pirbright Institute can be successfully infected using a strain of Schmallenberg virus originally isolated in Germany.

The impacts of the study could improve understanding of SBV vectors work across Europe, according Dr Veronsei.

"Understanding how Schmallenberg virus replicates in our colony midges is hugely important in standardising techniques to identify vectors in Europe," said Dr Veronesi.

"Not only that, but it also allows us to examine rates of Schmallenberg virus replication at different temperatures, which impacts on speed of spread and also whether the virus can be passed from adult midges to their offspring. All these studies would be impossible to perform with midges collected from the field."

Dr Simon Carpenter, Head of Entomology at The Pirbright Institute emphasised the importance of the report and said that without this discovery scientists would depend on field populations for studies.

He stressed the problems of field populations as they depend on weather conditions.

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Dr Jabbar was recently awarded the Dairy Australia Science and Innovation Award and was a finalist for the 2013 Science and Innovation Awards for Young People in Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry.

Currently, the parasite has affected herds in pockets across Australia. At this stage there are no rapid, accurate diagnostic tests available for livestock producers nor is there a vaccine.

Dr Jabbar said he was pleased to win and will use the $22,000 for his research into creating a rapid, cost-effective diagnostic tool for regular monitoring and surveillance of theileriosis, underpinning better control and prevention of the disease.

“Preliminary research has shown that the bovine theileriosis parasite is in Victoria,” Dr Jabbar said. “This award will further support my research into the disease.”

At the moment, the parasite has affected herds in pockets of the industry and this research will help manage the spread.
Dairy Australia’s Program Manager Product Innovation, Dr Mani Iyer said Dairy Australia was pleased to be involved and help support innovative research.

“Dairy Australia is committed to supporting innovative young people and encouraging them to work in the dairy industry,” Dr Iyer said.

The Science and Innovation Awards for Young People in Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry provides recipients with grants of up to $22,000 each to undertake a project exploring an emerging scientific issue or innovation over a 12 month period.
Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Senator Joe Ludwig, presented the awards at a gala dinner at the Outlook 2013 conference in Canberra for the agriculture sector. Minister Ludwig said the Awards have been encouraging young researchers and innovators in science, innovation and technology in rural industries since 2001.

“With the objective of keeping Australia’s rural industries sustainable and profitable, the Awards turn ideas into a reality, at the same time showcasing the individual talents of our young scientists to the world,” Minister Ludwig said.

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It comes as research shows 60 per cent of meals consumed in the home are eaten in front of the TV – but nearly half are not enjoyable.

Highly Desirable TV Dinners – HDTV Dinners – is highlighting six simple recipes using Red Tractor beef and lamb and encouraging people to switch to them rather than buying ready meals or takeaways.

Jane Ritchie-Smith, EBLEX head of consumer marketing, said: “We know we should try to eat our evening meal at the table chatting to family and friends about our day but the reality is that, after a long day at work, many people just want to sit down and relax in front of the TV. Although there’s nothing wrong with the odd TV dinner, it’s worrying that so many people aren’t enjoying the food they’re eating.

“That’s why we’re launching a new campaign – Highly Desirable TV Dinners – to help transform mealtimes. With a few simple changes, you can turn a lacklustre meal into a fantastic dish for the family, making the food you’re eating as exciting as your favourite TV programme.”

The research commissioned for the campaign shows over a third of families regularly eat their meals together in front of the box without talking at all during meal times and the average person tucks into meals in front of their favourite programmes at least six times a week.

Actress and mum Angela Griffin, an ambassador for the HDTV Dinners campaign, said: “As a working mum, time is always a key factor in the meals I make but I do want to make sure my kids are eating the right things, so it’s great to be showing people how to create delicious, healthy meals that really are easy to make whether you’re at the table or in front of the TV.”

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