Improving the Sustainability of your Beef Farm: Lessons from Across Europe Irish Bovine Beef Meeting

Solutions to sustainability challenges facing the Irish beef sector will be addressed by a panel of Irish and European speakers at the third annual BovINE national meeting tomorrow evening, Tuesday, 25 October at 8.00pm.

Beef farmers, advisors, researchers and all others involved in the Irish beef industry are welcome to join the online meeting and contribute to discussions. BovINE is an EU-funded beef network aimed at addressing sustainability challenges in the beef sector. It is managed in Ireland by the IFA and Teagasc.

Richard Lynch, BovINE project manager, reports; “sharing solutions to sustainability challenges across Europe is one of the key objectives of BovINE.  The aim of this event is to ensure that Irish beef farmers have access to such knowledge”.

Speakers

Teagasc Head of Drystock Knowledge Transfer, Pearse Kelly, will deliver a keynote address on the importance of innovation on beef farms. Pearse Kelly notes; “Constant improvements in production and technical efficiency along with the adoption of new technologies can make a real positive difference on beef farms, across all aspects of sustainability.”

He will be followed by Clive Bright, an organic beef farmer from Ballymote, County Sligo.  Clive will give an overview of his 100% grass-fed beef production system. Clive’s farm doesn’t use any imported feeds or fertilisers yet it manages to remain consistently profitable. At the meeting, Clive will explain how he manages his suckler beef farm and how he has integrated agro-forestry as part of his system.

Buyers of Irish weanlings, Italian brothers, Alessandro and Paolo Vigna, will tell their story of finishing Irish born cattle in Italy. The Vigna family Group are one of the largest beef finishers in Italy, rearing and finishing over 20,000 cattle annually on four farms. Alessandro and Paolo will describe the evolution of their business and will explain how a rigid animal health and welfare strategy enabled them to become more sustainable.

Helen Fuchey from the French Livestock Institute, IDELE, will showcase a new labelling innovation aimed at offering consumers transparency when purchasing beef products with an aim of delivering a fairer price to farmers. On the night, Helene will discuss the ‘Renumera Score label’ which has just been rolled out on beef products for sale on French supermarket shelves.

There will be further information on the BovINE project including the project’s online repository – the BovINE Knowledge Hub – and the forthcoming BovINE magazine from Teagasc researchers Maeve Henchion and Richard Lynch.

A lively discussion and Q&A session is expected on the night, which will be moderated by the BovINE Irish network manager Kevin Kinsella. 

To register for the event, please use the following link: bit.ly/3EyOczU

For more information about BovINE visit the project website at www.bovine-eu.net

For further project information please contact:

Maeve Henchion, BovINE coordinator (maeve.henchion@teagasc.ie)

Richard Lynch, Project Manager (Richard.Lynch@teagasc.ie).

Kevin Kinsella, Irish Network Manager (Kevin@agspace.ie)