The Irish Cattle Breeding Federation (ICBF) wishes to inform farmers and industry partners that the next genetic evaluation will be published in September 2025, rather than the usual July release. This is due to the planned implementation of important upgrades to both the beef and dairy evaluations.
ICBF typically issues six evaluations annually, spaced roughly every two months. However, the scope and scale of the current changes—designed to align with international best practices and enhance the value of genetic indexes—require additional time for testing and implementation as well as industry collaboration.
All updates have been thoroughly reviewed and approved by both the Technical Advisory Group (TAG) and the ICBF Board.
What’s changing?
Beef Updates
- Revised Economic Values for both the Terminal and Replacement Indexes, ensuring they reflect current market conditions. For example, changes to carcass price, labour, land market value, etc.
- A new, more robust method to integrate international genetic data.
- Inclusion of farmer-recorded animal weight data from schemes like BEEP and SCEP, further enhancing evaluation accuracy.
Dairy Updates
- Updated Economic Values in the EBI, reflecting recent changes in input/output prices and production systems e.g. Milk price, labour, feed, etc.
- A base change for genetic evaluations: shifting the base from cows born in 2005 to cows born in 2015 — aligning the base population more closely with today’s herds.
- Introduction of an improved Health and Management evaluation, offering deeper insights into traits such as mastitis and lameness resistance as well as cow temperament and milking speed.
What does this mean for farmers?
When the September evaluation is released, some changes to herd figures are to be expected. This is completely normal and reflects the improvements being made to ensure indexes more accurately represent current genetics, economic conditions, and farm performance.
All current proofs remain valid and can continue to be used for breeding and selection decisions until then.
Genetic evaluations are always evolving to reflect the most up-to-date science, economics, and on-farm data. These updates ensure that the indexes farmers rely on remain accurate, relevant, and aligned with real-world conditions.
By regularly improving the system, we’re helping farmers make better breeding decisions that lead to more productive, profitable, and sustainable herds. Change may bring some short-term shifts in figures, but it’s ultimately about delivering long-term gains for farmers and the wider industry.
We appreciate your patience and continued trust as we work to deliver these important updates for the long-term benefit of Irish cattle breeding.