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FARMWIZARD WIN WELSH SHEEP EID TENDER

A NORTHERN Ireland business beat off competition from UK companies to win a Welsh government tender for an IT solution to demonstrate the benefits of electronic identification in sheep. FarmWizard, founded by Terry Canning, and animal-tagging company Dalton Electronic Identification (EID) Systems developed the winning IT solution for Welsh government’s technology, agriculture and greater efficiencies (TAG) EID project. The TAG project aims to improve the profitability of Welsh sheep farms through technology. EID technology for sheep will become law at the end of this year. FarmWizard and Daltons’ solution combines EID tags, readers, web based software and equipment from leading manufacturers to deliver time saving and performance monitoring benefits to sheep farmers. Mr Canning said: “We intend to demonstrate how we can harness this technology to provide real business benefit, following the introduction of mandatory sheep EID technology in the UK at the start of this year.” Electronic tags now provide error free individual identification, making the process of managing treatments, weights and performance recording for the whole flock achievable without being labour intensive. As a result, farmers are more inclined to record animal data on a regular basis leading to more accurate performance monitoring of the flock.

If regularly weighed, lambs can be selected using their electronic ear tag or I-Tag upon reaching their optimal sale weight. Those not yet ready are drafted into holding pens to be turned out to the field until ready. With weights recorded and uploaded into FarmWizard it’s easy to build performance information on a flock. This allows farmers to make better buy, cull or breed decisions when analyzing the weight gain charts and reports available to provide a better return on cost. FarmWizard & Dalton have EID solutions available for beef, suckler, dairy and sheep farmers. Pictured below, Terry Canning with Welsh Assembly Minister for Rural Affairs Elin Jones