As we approach a new year, Rare Breeds Survival Trust Chief Executive, Christopher Price, reflects on how the UK’s rare native animal breeds have fared in 2024.
In 2024, the challenges of the past four years were evident for a number of the UK’s rare native breeds. The impacts of Covid restrictions, bird flu regulations, the economic climate and rising costs have been reflected in the position and outlook for some breeds.
However, we have also seen positive outcomes from some fantastic breeding programmes, scientific research, collaborative projects, conservation innovations, produce development, and our promotion programmes over the same time period.
GOOD NEWS FOR SEVERAL RARE BREEDS
It was fantastic to see this work paying off with positive news for a number of rare breeds in the April 2024 Watchlist. We celebrated the fact that Greyface Dartmoor sheep have shown sufficient improvement and the breed is no longer categorised as rare on the RBST Watchlist. Since 2009, the number of flocks has increased by 155%. There were also positive trends for Norfolk Horn sheep, Vaynol cattle, Irish Moiled cattle, the native goat breeds, the New Forest pony, the Dartmoor pony and the Exmoor pony breeds. These positive trends are a fantastic reflection of the dedication of those working with rare breeds, and of the growing appreciation among keepers and farmers that these are great breeds for modern times, and among consumers of the fantastic quality of their produce.
NATIVE POULTRY AND PIG BREEDS IN NEED OF SUPPORT
However the 2024 Watchlist also highlighted our serious concerns for the native poultry and pig breeds. We moved all the UK’s native chicken, duck, geese and turkey breeds into the Priority rare breed category in response to the devastating impact on poultry breeding programmes in recent years of avian flu restrictions combined with significant increases in animal husbandry costs. Seven of the UK’s 11 native pig breeds remain in the Priority category, with most of the rare pig breeds now showing a sustained downward trend in total sow numbers. We must reverse these worrying declines before it is too late and we have been calling on Government to broaden the new ELM scheme to include payments for native pigs and poultry as well as grazing animals.
This article extract was taken from the January 2025 edition of The Country Smallholder. To read the article in full, you can buy the issue here.
