New identification system offers hope to livestock farmers
A ground-breaking project to develop an accurate and cost-efficient method for monitoring sheep movements is now under development thanks to a project team headed by Melton-Mowbray based Pera Technology.
Rosei sheep test
A ground-breaking project to develop an accurate and cost-efficient method for monitoring sheep movements is now under development thanks to a project team headed by Melton-Mowbray based Pera Technology.
The objective of the ‘ROSEI’ project is to develop a Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) ear tag that will improve the probability of 100% accurate identification of sheep; something that is vital for food-chain tracking and for farmers who are reliant on single farm subsidies. The solution will finally provide an affordable and reliable response to the current burden on livestock farmers to meet European Commission (EC) legislation which was strengthened following the 2001 foot and mouth outbreak.
The current EC legislation is difficult to meet with the existing Low Frequency (LF) identification systems, which reportedly only recall 90% to 95% of tagged sheep. Any misidentified animals could result in a significant subsidy penalty.
Brian Stevens, Project Manager at Pera Technology, said: “Current methods of group identification are inadequate and can lead to severe penalties, which farmers can ill afford. More importantly, the uncontrolled movement of animals could lead to the spread of disease, which was the main driver for the introduction of such stringent legislation in the first place.
“If successful in reaching our objectives, livestock farmers will have an affordable and reliable response to EC legislation. This could protect them from subsidy loss of 10’s of thousands of pounds and the country against a repeat of the €11 billion loss that occurred during the 2001 foot and mouth outbreak.”
The ROSEI proposal is for a LF and Ultra High Frequency (UHF) dual band solution which will offer longer range and faster read rates. It will also permit the implementation of advanced livestock management systems that use electronic identification to accurately monitor animals. The project is a €1.6 million European initiative to develop a solution using state of the art device physics, mobile information technology, and systems engineering.
The ROSEI partners are Pera Technology, Agrident BV, T.L.R. Ltd, Page Up, Universitetet for Miljo Og Biovitenskap, MC Hugh Michael and the Sponsors Roxan Developments Ltd.
For further information on the Rosei project visit http://www.rosei.org.uk/rosei/home.eb
