Ministers in the Department of Agriculture, Food and Marine have teamed up have with a special announcement on the world-first scientific breakthrough that can enable the reduction of methane from the Irish cattle herd through animal genetics.
Ministers, Charlie McConalogue and Martin Haydon have recently announced that research from a €3 million project “GREENBREED” has published their findings. This project published results with the world’s first national genomic evaluations for methane emission in Irish Beef cattle. Evidence of large daily differences of emissions in livestock fed the same but been traced to have having genetics differences. These studies find that breeding programs can reduce methane emissions for selecting low-emitting livestock.
The research highlights the potential to breed more environmentally sustainably animals thus not having a negative impact on animal performance and more importantly the profitability.
Full details and results from the project can be found here: gov.ie – Ministers McConalogue and Heydon announce scientific breakthrough in reducing methane emissions (www.gov.ie)
