UK farmers can now breed healthier and more productive animals with the use of advanced genetic fingerprinting tests for cattle and sheep.

While EBVs have enabled farmers to improve overall levels of efficiency and productivity in recent years, this new genetic selection aid introduced by Pfizer Animal Genetics, should be even more accurate at predicting the performance of animals for up to 14 different traits from a hair sample taken at a few weeks of age.

According to Pfizer, the 50k snip chip, containing 50,000 gene markers, provides much more genetic information, than the company’s GeneStar marker based on 56 genes, and can be used to select for a wide range of characteristics including fertility, susceptibility to disease, daily liveweight gain, dry matter intake, milk yield and ease of calving. Interestingly, it can also be used to increase muscle depth, meat yield, meat tenderness, fat levels and marbling.

Not surprisingly, it has already been taken up by farmers looking to obtain more money from the market place and a select number of processors supplying supermarkets aiming to provide a consistent line of superior quality beef.

“Genomic values are accurate, they work and they can increase profits,” said Paul Westaway a tenant beef farmer from Gloucester whose aim has always to produce profitable beef of a consistent quality.

While Mr Westaway struggled to have a viable business in previous years, the switch to using the genomic evaluated Aberdeen-Angus bull, Melview Goliath 2 G009, which is ranked in the top 15% for tenderness; the top 20% for ribeye and the top 15% for fat content and boasts an increased overall profit index of +£77, has enabled profit margins from the progeny of this bull to increase by £77 per head, which on a 260kg carcase represented 29p per kg. This was due to the fact that the resultant calves were easier to finish, and finished at an earlier age off grass. Overall, the 103 head of beef cattle by Goliath produced average carcase weights of 259.5kg having finished at 17.8months of age, with the final six months off grass alone.

“I don’t believe we’ll ever see beef at £4 per kg in this country but you can achieve the equivalent in financial performance by using the right genetics. Profit per head is much more important than price per kg and the beef produced is of a much more consistent quality.”

However, to improve the overall quality of beef on a national scale, the current classification of carcases has to be changed with industry leaders accepting the EUROPE grid system has no correlation with meat quality and is more associated with meat yield.