482 herds in Mayo more than 40km away from a vet
There are 482 herds in Mayo more than 40km away from a vet, a Dáil committee has been told.
Sinn Féin Deputy Matt Carty raised the matter at the meeting of the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture during a debate on EU regulations on veterinary medicinal products.
Mayo TD Michael Ring said the Department of Agriculture has long insisted that the way to dispense medication is through a prescribing web, which it is actually developing.
"I am told that the design of the web is way behind already. The department is talking about January 28 as the date on which it will launch this website and have it up and running.
"Has the department a contingency plan if this is not going to happen?
"I do not have an awful lot of confidence in some of the departments when people cannot leave this country and thousands of people cannot get a passport.
"Now we have another department taking on more responsibility and I am afraid that it will not be able to deliver," he stated.
Peter Collins, assistant principal officer with the Department of Agriculture, said Deputy Ring is correct in stating the department has taken on on a huge and onerous task.
"We have looked at different options but the main objective is to keep a competitive market and provide farmers with a greater choice as to where they get medicines.
"Obviously we want to collect the information in one go so that we can report to the EU on that basis.
"There are a number of reasons for introducing the system. Building it and getting contractors on board has been a challenge.
"The contractors have been in since March and we have been doing a lot of the business requirements and the collection of information since then as well as prior to that.
"There has been a lot of development and movement on the system in the last four or five months. A considerable amount of work has been done on the back end systems to put this all together.
"We have had a number of stakeholder engagements. I am not sure from where the Deputy Ring heard that the department is way behind.
"We have heard a couple of those rumours and we are not sure from where people got that information.
"We have spoken to vets, licensed merchants, feed mills, dispensers, pharmacy companies and pharmacy software companies.
"All of those people are involved in the whole spectrum of prescribing and dispensing everywhere. We have put all of those together."
Deputy Jackie Cahill, chair of the committee, said the department has carried out research and analysis into the distribution and accessibility to farmers of large-animal veterinary services in rural Ireland.
"The outcome of this analysis was relatively positive, in that it identified that large animal veterinary services are available within 20 km to more than 95% of Irish livestock farms.
"While the provision of veterinary services to members of the public in Ireland is a private sector activity, nonetheless the department will, from a public policy perspective, continue to monitor this position closely, recognising that it is critical that Irish farmers are adequately supported with the provision of veterinary services in the best interests of animal health and welfare," he added.