Sheep eID: Electronic tags

Wool growers in some states may face having to double tag older sheep if the mandatory eID rollout isn’t harmonised, says WoolProducers Australia.

Wool growers in some states are facing the prospect of having to double tag older sheep if the mandatory rollout of electronic identification in sheep isn’t harmonised.

WoolProducers Australia is calling for harmonisation from all jurisdictions involved in the rollout.

WPA chief executive Jo Hall said in a recent newsletter WPA’s support for mandatory eIDs was contingent on the establishment of a multi-species database, national harmonisation and equitable cost sharing arrangements between industry and government for the establishment and maintenance.

“It is therefore, beyond frustrating that 17-months after the announcement of this rollout that we do not seem to be on track to meet these three contingencies. While some states have announced financial incentives for tags, many have not,” Ms Hall said.

“It is unbelievable that wool growers may be in a position of having to double tag older sheep to send to slaughter with an eID when they are already tagged with a visual tag. This is the prospect that currently faces all sheep producers as soon as 2027.”

WPA president Steve Harrison told The Weekly Times they were trying to get harmonisation from all jurisdictions and believed it was an opportunity missed.

Mr Harrison said nothing had happened to move the eID process forward in some states.

“WPA suggests a phase-in over five years and tags must be under $1.”

Mr Harrison said they continued to advocate this position at the national level but it was not supported by any other representative in industry or government.

“To double tag sheep will adversely affect sheep and wool growers if this program is managed poorly,” he said.

“We are doing our best to prevent an exotic disease outbreak, what’s the price of our commodity if that happens.”

NSW Farmers has been strong on their advocacy that mandatory eID tags for sheep should cost no more than $1 per tag, however they were still not under that price.

NSW Farmers president Xavier Martin said their policy is that the cost of sheep eID tags should be no more than $1 per tag at retail during the transition period.

“With mandatory eID commencing from 1 January 2025, the NSW Government must act quickly and reduce tag costs like the SA Government, so that producers can comply with government-mandated eID,” Mr Martin said.

He said NSW Farmers provided conditional support to the sheep traceability reforms and support for traceability reform was dependent on a number of principles, including it have jurisdictional harmonisation and reduce tag costs to an economically affordable level.

Victoria is currently the only state that has rolled out mandatory eID for sheep and goats, a process which started in 2017.

The National Biosecurity Committee established the Sheep and Goat Traceability Task Force to work towards a mandatory national traceability system using eID for sheep and goats by January 1, 2025.