Simherd is proud to contribute to BIOSECURE a forthcoming four-year project supported by the European Union with a budget of 5 million euro. The project is coordinated by Ghent University, together with 19 participating partners, from 12 European countries. Biosecurity is critical for management of animal health and disease control however, implementation at farm level often remains insufficient. Therefore, the objective of the BIOSECURE project is to enable decision makers in livestock farming to understand, prioritise and implement evidence-based, cost effective and sustainable biosecurity management systems. This will be carried out through various work packages and tasks that include:
i) reviewing the current understanding of biosecurity throughout the livestock production chain
ii) quantifying the impact of biosecurity practices on the prevention of infection and spread of disease
iii) enhancing current biosecurity measures, as well as expanding on these by carrying out field studies and performing experiments.
iv) the socio-economic impact of the BIOSECURE project will be assessed
v) stakeholder engagement will be facilitated to support knowledge transfer and implementation of key exploitable results.
SimHerd will participate in the cost benefit analysis of the biosecurity measures in dairy cattle herd. The new or enhanced biosecurity management systems developed in the BIOSECURE project will help farmers of various animal species (pigs, poultry, cattle, small ruminants) and of different production types (indoor -outdoor) to keep animals healthy. Stay tuned for great research to follow.