Mr. Michael Sheahan:

It is not going to happen immediately, but it would be fair to say that a lot of progress has been made in respect of traceability in horses albeit there is still a long way to go. As we discussed at our most recent visit to the committee, we always talk about how good our cattle traceability system is and to a lesser extent, how good our sheep and pig systems are. The horse system, while it has come a long way, is not at the same stage as the AIM system for cattle. Having said that, we should acknowledge that we have come a long way from where we started our journey to trace horses. The Department became involved in horse traceability in 2012. In that year, we introduced a central database for the first time. In 2013 or 2014, the change of ownership legislation was introduced. In 2014, EU legislation, and Irish legislation thereafter, considerably strengthened the identification of horses because it included the need for them to be microchipped and so on.

We mentioned at the most recent meeting we had with the committee that we were planning an equine census. That census happened in November 2021. There will be a further equine census in November 2022 because there were some issues with the technology and so on in last year's census. We are moving towards more real-time information about where horses are at any time. There are particular difficulties with tracking horses compared to cattle because as part of the training and breeding processes, horses move considerably more often. We are moving in that direction but it is unrealistic to say we could introduce that recommendation immediately. The census was an important step on that journey and there will be a follow-on census in November this year which we hope will build on that progress. There are plans to give people access to the equivalent on an AIM database that will allow horse owners to update their profile in real time, similar to the process in respect of cattle. It will take a bit of time but significant progress is being made.