NAIT boss defends scheme over M. bovis outbreak response

At a time when non-compliance with NAIT is getting blamed for making the response much harder than it should be, NAIT chief executive Michelle Edge is defendeing the system as “philosophically well-designed”.

“The system has functioned as it needed to where the data was in it and where farmers have kept their accounts up to date. We’ve been able to trace stock.”

Edge spoke in a closed session to a recent Federated Farmers dairy and sharemilkers combined council meeting in Christchurch.

Interviewed later, she said provisions for enforcing compliance are available in the scheme. 

“I think further application of compliance needs to occur, but there’s definitely some need for farmers to be diligent around their requirements.”

Two committees steering a review of the system are now finalising their recommendations. Consultation will follow but the timing will be in MPI’s hands, Edge told Rural News.

“I can’t give any specifics yet, but I can say that there are recommendations associated with the identification of livestock, how movements need to be recorded, and the roles and responsibilities of various players involved in the system.”

The focus is on compliance and what will be applied, Edge says.

“Essentially the system of traceability – having to tag an animal, register it, register your premises and register your movements – those philosophical elements are unlikely to change because that is the basis of any system in the world.”

Feds’ dairy section chair Chris Lewis says lots of questions were put to Edge by the council members. It was good to get the questions asked and answered, he said.

Lewis says changes must come to make NAIT more user-friendly.

“We’re in the 21st century now. We want iPads and apps,” he told Rural News.

“At the moment the NAIT software’s quite clunky and that’s why people get frustrated. Do I need to keep two or three software programs for herd records? Or is there one which talks freely with the main provider?

“If the system’s easy to use, farmers will comply.”

Frustrating times

Feds dairy chief Chris Lewis has told fellow farmers of his frustration at spending nine months watching Mycoplasma bovis spread.

“We should strive to get back to the situation where at least the North Island is clear. It should then be easy to stop the spread of infection north of Cook Strait and get on with containing it and hopefully in the long run stamping M. bovis out.”

Lewis says he’d been frustrated, at times, with the response of MPI and he wasn’t the only one.

“It’s unclear whether an improved NAIT scheme would’ve been better to contain the spread of the disease, but the experts are clear that the movement of infected cattle has been the underlying cause of the spread of M.bovis to other properties.”

Encouraging all cattle farmers to get their NAIT records up to date, Lewis says record-keeping “has not been as good as it could be” on the infected properties.

“It is clear MPI has had to spent a helluva lot of time and money trying to find out where animals have gone, because NAIT records were not up to scratch. These resources could have been better spent trying to eradicate the disease.”

He says the reasons for con-compliance with NAIT were complex and numerous. It was seen by some farmers as a compliance cost.

The disease is a wake-up call, Lewis says.

“Other countries have learned to live with M.bovis. New Zealand farmers would rather live without it.”