BVD Free England
BVD Free England has been launched today, on Friday 1st July. BVDFree is a national scheme that aims to achieve the eradication of Bovine Viral Diarrhoea (BVD) virus from all cattle herds in the country by 2022. The BVDFree scheme is based on achieving the elimination of BVD through identification and removal of animals persistently infected (PIs) with BVD. BVDFree will be run on a voluntary basis until most of the cattle industry is covered by the scheme. BVDFree will then look to work with Government to introduce compulsory measures.
Farmers can join the scheme by visiting the website www.bvdfree.org.uk and registering their details online. They will also find more details about BVD and how they can achieve elimination in their herd.
By joining the scheme, farmers agree to:
1. Actively engage in BVD control in order to eradicate BVD from their herd
2. Report all BVD testing results from their herd to the BVDFree database
3. Allow herd status/individual animal status to be openly accessible through the BVDFree database
4. Not to move persistently infected (PI) animals other than directly to slaughter (or through a dedicated red meat slaughter market)
- 5th July 2016
