Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry South, Independent)
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422. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the reason he is allowing his Department to restrict persons who are dealing in cattle (details supplied); and if he will make a statement on the matter. [24682/14]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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The requirement for cattle dealers to obtain a Certificate of Compliance prior to the movement of animals from their holding directly to another keeper was introduced from February 1st 2013. This requirement was already in place for many years for all other keepers moving bovines directly from their holding to another holding and was extended to dealers in order to ensure that movements of animals out of all herds, including dealers’ herds, are pre-cleared against data already held by my Department.

Prior to the extension of this requirement to dealers, dealers notified bovine movements out of their herds using the NBAS 31G form and, given that these forms were recorded onto the Animal Identification and Movement (AIM) database post-movement, these movements could not be validated against animal and keeper data already held on the Department’s databases. This measure has strengthened the integrity of data maintained on the AIM system.