Five breed societies pull Euro-star indices

Five cattle breed societies have now decided to withdraw the Irish Cattle Breeding Federation (ICBF) Euro-star indices from their sale catalogues. The Irish Simmental Cattle Society, the Irish Salers Cattle Society, Irish Charolais Cattle Society, Irish Parthenaise Cattle Society and the Irish Blonde d’Aquitaine Cattle Society have all moved away from printing the indices.

The Salers Society said: “It has become increasingly difficult to breed top-end cattle and still maintain figures within the top 20-40% of the herdbook. It’s regrettable that the new ICBF figures are no longer a true reflection of an animal’s value.”

Both the Charolais Society and the Blonde d’Aquitaine Society said they no longer have any confidence in the ICBF Euro-star indices.

Speaking to the Irish Farmers Journal, the Charolais Society added that the indices are meant to be a representation of the profitability of the progeny of a particular animal.

“Unfortunately, the current indices bear no relation at all to the profitability of the progeny.”

The Simmental Society said its breeders decided to “not publish the evaluations, because they do not believe they are accurate”.

“Very small cow types are getting to the top of the replacement index, as can be seen by the actual performance of the top replacement sires listed by ICBF”.

A meeting of the South Eastern Limousin Club this week put a motion forward to the Irish Limousin Cattle Society council to follow other breed societies in not publishing indices. The council is expected to make a decision this week.

ICBF CEO Seán Coughlan told the Irish Farmers Journal: “We are currently working on three key areas highlighted in the recent beef stakeholder forums. These include updating the calving evaluations to better account for foreign data, inclusion of the farmer recorded SCEP weights and updating the economic values. The changes will be implemented over the summer when the research is complete. There is also ongoing work in relation to the weanling price trait, which will also get implemented over the summer.

“We are committed to ongoing engagement with the breed societies and the wider industry.”