Loading ...Bovine TB and Badgers – the debate grinds on – part 3
So what is the farming and agricultural industries view of bovine tuberculosis and the need for culling badgers in order to halt the spread of bTB in British cattle?
The National Farmers’ Union (NFU) are one of the most outspoken non-government organisations calling for badger culling to be reintroduced into Britain. To get some idea of the strength of feeling on this subject you only need go to their website and read the NFU reaction to the ISG report on bovine turberculosis dated 18 June 2007.
In this reaction they state “The final report of the Independent Scientific Group into bTB in cattle and badgers rules out culling on any scale. Whilst the report admits that badgers are ‘clearly a source’ and ‘contribute significantly to TB in cattle, culling can make ‘no meaningful contribution’” and go on to quote NFU President Peter Kendall saying that “he would be seeking urgent meetings with Defra Ministers and officials in order to devise a culling strategy that would make a worthwhile difference to the disease situation.”
It seems a strange reaction on the face of it, here we finally get the results of a ten year study and it is immediately dismissed because the conclusion simply doesn’t suit their views.
Following the release of the ERFA Select Committee report on this issue in Feb 2007 NFU’s chairman for the North West, Alistair Mackintosh is reported as saying “Farmers have been doing their bit with pre movement testing but at the same time have been bearing huge costs because of standardised valuations. There have been instances when we have managed to get farms free of TB only to find that they are struck down again for no apparent reason. It has to be coming from the surrounding wildlife.”
This is where we begin to see the issues for farmers. Standardised valuations for cattle slaughtered due to bTB infection means that my lop eared old cow that hasn’t produced milk or calves for 2 years has a given value and my neighbours prize pedigree cow a given value but because of standardisation I am laughing all the way to the bank and my neighbour is crying into his cup of tea. He is not paid the worth of the pedigree cow and clearly this is simply an unfair system of compensation. Having said that most farmers are fairly compensated financially but that is not the whole story.
If you read any documents by the NFU or the farming newspapers you will see constant reference to the emotional stress this issue causes farmers and their families. Many conservation sites dismiss this as pulling heart strings because the farmer is breeding cattle for slaughter, he is simply being paid by the government instead of the supermarket. Whilst I accept that the NFU tend to use rather emotive language and overstate their case a little, as can be seen in their leaflet factsheet on bovine tb I also believe that conservationists speaking on this issue show a lack of understanding of farmers and farming life.
Yes farmers are breeding animals to sell for slaughter in order to produce our Sunday roasts, many people forget that when they nip into Tesco for a joint of beef and then complain about farmers receiving compensation for stock. However most, not all but most, farmers take great pride in their work, this isn’t a 9-5 job you can forget about at home time. Farming is a whole life, your life is timed according to seasons, feeding, milking, etc. Your herd is your families bread and butter, with the whole family involved in rearing healthy, hopefully valuable, beasts.
We all saw images of farmers standing at gates crying when their herds were culled during FMD, there is something very personal about rearing farm animals. You accept that they are taken to market and slaughtered for meat but that is part of the circle of life and unless you wish to leave farming you never sell your whole herd. When your whole herd are slaughtered due to disease your entire life’s work is gone, years of selective breeding gone in a day and then nothing to do but wait for compensation and consider how you will start again. I have yet to meet a farmer that doesn’t have favourites among the herd that suddenly develop a problem when it’s time to send cattle to market, farmers are not devoid of emotion they simply accept the death of their animals to produce the best meat possible for you the consumer.
Why farmers get so angry about the badger debate is due to the governments lack of commitment to tackle the problem head on, not a hatred of badgers. We had a badger sett in our woods and my ex would allow legal hunting on his land but always warned hunters what he would do to them if they disturbed the badgers. His whole life has been lived in the country, among wildlife, he doesn’t just nip out to look at the pretty animals at the weekend, he lives among them and luckily we lived in a relatively TB free zone so the badgers were kept safe.
The ISG report accepted that badgers are a contributing factor to the spread of bTB but did not recommend culling because this spreads the disease outward of the kill zone and is not practically and economically feasible. The King report concluded that culling in hotspots could reduce the spread of the disease. Yet the governments strategy to deal with bovine turberculosis has remained with ineffective skin testing of cattle.
Yes some farmers just want to kill all the badgers and think that will eradicate bTB but most accept an organised cull in hotspots, together with effective testing and working towards vaccines is the only way to tackle bTB in the long term but constantly delaying decisions and shelling out compensation is simply doing nothing, bTB is still spreading and yes farmers are totally frustrated with the inactivity.
Are farmers the innocent victims in this, no not at all. It only takes one bad farmer in an area to move diseased cattle onto his land or take them to a show or market and the surrounding area and other herds are at risk. I have met farmers that don’t give a monkeys behind about their neighbours or wildlife but they are in the small minority. I have also met farmers that when asked “what about gamma interferon testing” will reply “bugger that mumbo jumbo just kill the badgers”. The majority of farmers I have spoken to about this issue simply want action, we have reports upon reports and yet virtually no action or long term strategy to deal with the continued spread of bovine tuberculosis.
The remaining posts in this series can be found here:
Bovine TB and Badgers – the debate grinds on part 1
Bovine TB and Badgers – the debate grinds on part 2
Bovine TB and Badgers – the debate grinds – conclusion
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