Arable advocacy?
OPINION: Spare a thought for the arable farmer, squeezed on one side by soft global prices and on the other by limits on further yield increases.
According to the NZ Merino Company's Dave Maslen, by June 2025 farmers will have to "administer pain relief for castration, tailing, and any severe shearing injuries on farms".
"This is a step we need to take as pain mitigation is quickly becoming a non-negotiable for some markets and it is already a requirement of other internatinal ethical wool standards," Maslen claims.
However, Federated Farmers Toby Williams says while it did not have a problem with farmers meeting animal welfare requirements for pain relief during tail docking and pain relief was not a requirement under animal welfare standards.
MPI says no pain relief was needed on lambs younger than six months.
