Livestock phenomics survey – share your views

Stakeholders across the livestock sector, including farmers, breeders, researchers, policymakers, veterinarians, technology providers, and members of the public, are being invited to share their knowledge and perceptions of livestock phenomics. Dr. Orla Keane, Teagasc Researcher tells us more.

Animal breeding relies on the availability of accurate and specific phenotype data to identify superior animals for breeding programs and to accelerate genetic gain. However, obtaining high-quality phenotypes is increasingly being recognized as a limiting factor in all applications of livestock genetics and genomics. The acquisition of relevant phenotypes is also fundamental to routine and daily management of livestock in order to optimise reproduction strategies, disease control and animal welfare.

New and improved phenotyping technologies will facilitate long-term economically, socially and environmentally sustainable livestock farming. Phenomics is emerging as a major new technical discipline in biology. Phenomics is focused on one major aim: to systematically describe the phenome i.e. the physical and molecular traits of an organism.

The European Network on Livestock Phenomics (EU-LI-PHE) is a multidisciplinary and inclusive community of experts whose goal is to enhance scientific collaboration, catalyse developments, and facilitate technology transfer of livestock phenomics concepts and applications to improve the sustainability and competitiveness of the European livestock production sector.

The EU-LI-PHE network is interested in evaluating the knowledge of livestock phenomics and the perceived benefits and risks associated with application of these technologies and related innovations. EU-LI-PHE has developed a survey to collect information on the knowledge and perceptions of livestock phenomics to be distributed to relevant stakeholders, including farmers, animal breeders, researchers, policy makers, veterinarians, technology providers, civil society, non-governmental organisations, students, associations and relevant industries.

The survey takes no more than 10 minutes to complete and can be accessed here.