Margaret Brennan, Assistant Principal Officer over Beef Schemes with the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine, is on this week’s Beef Edge podcast to discuss the new Beef Welfare Scheme announced recently and to give an update on all things scheme related.

The objective of the Beef Welfare Scheme 2025 (BWS) is to further increase the economic efficiency of and enhance animal health and husbandry on suckler farms. 

You can apply if you: 

- are aged eighteen years or over on the date of submission of the application for participation

- are the holder of an active herd number with Herd Owner Status. Herd Keeper is not acceptable

- are farming a holding in respect of which a Basic Income Support for Sustainability (BISS) Application is submitted in 2025 to the Department

- are a suckler beef farmer i.e. have eligible calves born to eligible suckler cows in the period 1 July 2024 – 30 June 2025

- are an “Active Farmer” as defined in the Terms and Conditions

There is one mandatory action that must be completed. You can select optional actions: Action 1 – Meal Feeding (Mandatory Action). Participants must introduce meal feeding for a period of 4 weeks pre-weaning and 2 weeks post-weaning to reduce the stress on calves at weaning time.

Action 2 – Vaccination (Optional Action). If action 2, vaccination, is selected at application stage, participants must implement a vaccination programme against clostridial diseases and/or calf pneumonia in suckler calves and record details of the vaccination.

Action 3 – Faecal Testing / Forage Testing (Optional Action). If action 3, Faecal Testing/Forage Testing is selected at application stage, participants must: carry out two (2) faecal tests (with a minimum of four (4) weeks between each test) for specified parasites and submit for testing or take three (3) forage samples and submit for testing. All sampling kits must be purchased no later than 13 October 2025.

Participants will be presented with the number of eligible calves born on their holding between 01 July 2024 and 30 June 2025 at application stage. Participants will have the option at application stage to select the number of calves for participation in the scheme.

Rate of payment:

Action 1 – Meal Feeding (Mandatory): the rate of payment is €35 per eligible calf up to a maximum of 45 eligible calves.

Action 2 – Vaccination (Optional): The rate of payment is €15 per eligible calf up to a maximum of 45 eligible calves. 

Action 3 – Faecal Testing / Forage Testing (Optional): The rate of payment is €25 per eligible calf up to a maximum of 45 eligible calves.

Payments will commence to cleared cases in December 2025.

Applications must be made on agfood.ie The closing date for applications is 23.59:59hrs on 24 September 2025. You must read the Terms and Conditions for full information.

For more episodes from the Beef Edge podcast, visit the show page at:
https://www.teagasc.ie/thebeefedge

 
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