Rural Payments and Services

Beef Efficiency Scheme (BES) – 2020 – early selection from spring born animals

As per the 2020 Scheme update, businesses had the opportunity to voluntarily enter their spring born calving data by 9 June to receive an early selection, due to the possibility of selling early. Some stock bulls have also been selected in this round.

The Scheme requirement is to selection from 20% of a business’ reference animals.

Due to the current conditions, and where enough animals have been recorded on the ScotEID database; a selection will be made. Ideally you should tag these animals as soon as possible; but they must reach the lab no later than 31 December 2020.

The tags will begin to issue from mid July 2020, as they are manufactured.

Due to the coronavirus pandemic new procedures are in place regarding the manufacturing and distribution of the tissue sample tags. Allflex, the tagging supplier has put in place appropriate measures, based on the guidance issued to businesses.

Couriers are all regulated by the government guidelines whereby they are ensuring delivery and receipt confirmation of deliveries can be made contactless and avoiding physical contact when handing goods over to customers.

If you have not received your tags by the middle of August 2020, please contact the BES Team as soon as possible so that the package can be traced.

If you have had animals selected, the list of animals for your business will be identified on your ScotEID BES account, on the tagging tab.

The kit will include tags, return packaging and a submission form. There will be two copies of the submission form, please complete both and retain one for your records.

We strongly recommend you obtain proof of postage as this is confirmation you have sent the tags back to the laboratory. If the BES team find your tags have been lost in the post, the proof of postage will ensure no reduction is applied to your payment.

The return deadline for tissue samples is 31 December 2020. However, we would ask that you return the samples to the lab as quickly as possible after they have been taken.

If a selected animal has died or has been sold prior to you receiving the tags, please mark the reason it has not been tagged on the submission form and additional animals will be selected in future tagging rounds. Failing to mark the reason on the form will lead to delays in processing future payments.

If an animal selected is still on your holding when you receive the tags they must be tissue tagged and the sample returned to the laboratory.

Tissue tags inserted for breed society purposes or Bovine Viral Diarrhoea (BVD) testing will not normally be compatible with BES. The tags supplied from the laboratory will therefore have to be inserted in these circumstances. Failure to return a tissue sample or a blood sample for a bull will result in a reduction being applied to the scheme year payment.

If you have already taken tissue tag samples from 100% of your calves and you have retained the tissue samples on farm, you do not have to tissue tag these animals again. You should return the stored samples for the selected animals to the laboratory, using the return packaging provided. The tags from the laboratory can be destroyed in an appropriate manner.

If you have any queries please contact the Beef Efficiency Scheme team – besmailbox@gov.scot.