Reducing the finishing age nationally

The Beef Edge

Reducing the mean finishing age of prime beef cattle from 26 to 22-23 months by 2030 is fundamental to achieving Ireland’s 25% reduction in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from agriculture and on this week’s episode of the Beef Edge podcast, Teagasc researcher Paul Smith discusses this topic.

Paul explains the main messages relating to reducing age at slaughter from the BEEF2024 Open Day and future research surrounding the grass-based beef research in comparison to commercial high performing beef farms.

He outlines the important talking points from the greenhouse gas village at BEEF2024 and he also discusses the finishing village which aimed to highlight carcass specifications, in particular the correct fat score.

Nationally, mean age at finishing is six to nine months later than on grass-based research and high-performing commercial farms. There is an urgent need to identify and quantify factors impeding Irish beef farms from achieving potential liveweight targets throughout the animal’s lifetime.

Collaborative research from the Teagasc-led Beef-Quest project aims to investigate the effect of nutrition, health and on-farm environment factors constraining animal growth performance and finishing age of beef cattle, and assess their impacts on GHG emissions.

In collaboration with the Irish Cattle Breeding Federation (ICBF) and UCD, this project will use data available within the industry. A new large-scale on-farm study is planned to generate new data and expressions of interest for participant farms will be sought in the coming months.

Beef-Quest will identify, quantify and rank the primary on-farm technical and behavioural-related issues negatively impacting finishing age. Using this new information, more targeted, high-impact and deliverable solutions can be proposed and disseminated to reduce finishing age, thus improving the Irish beef’s sustainability.

If you are interested in participating please contact [e-mail]

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

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