Last week saw the start of the 2nd year of culling in the government’s planned 4 year programme to test the effectiveness and humaneness of marksmen led shooting of badgers in curbing bovine TB. After what the Independent Expert Panel deemed a failure, in terms of numbers of badgers culled and humaneness, changes have been made to this year’s culling practice. Firstly, instead of utilizing the data collection techniques outlines by the scientific panel they are relying on the reporting of the marksmen involved in the cull, data described by Rosie Woodroffe (IoZ) as “…so utterly inadequate it was barely considered in 2013”. Secondly, badgers in the counties surrounding the study area are being vaccinated, further confounding any comparison with the previous years cull.
Bovine TB is a genuine issue for British agriculture, with the UK having the highest bovine TB rates in Europe. The government states it wants science-led policy but cites costs as the reason for current changes in data collection. However, with leading news agencies such as the Telegraph (“But last year, just 48 per cent of the estimated badger population in west Somerset was culled by a combination of shooting and trapping animals, and just 39 per cent in Gloucestershire”)1, the Guardian(“In Somerset, 65% of the badger population was killed while in Gloucestershire the figure was 40%”)2 and the Conversation (“…cull teams only managed to kill between 28% and 48%. Culling periods were extended, but still the total kill rose to only something between 31% and 56%...”) all reporting different statistics for the first well organised and reported cull, what kind of information will we get from this new version. The move by the government to dispense with scientific advice means that the public will now only get information from partisan sides, further polarizing opinions. Even if this culling policy is effective, which seems unlikely, this current scheme makes it impossible for scientists, the public or policy makers to ever know.
Bovine TB is a genuine issue for British agriculture, with the UK having the highest bovine TB rates in Europe. The government states it wants science-led policy but cites costs as the reason for current changes in data collection. However, with leading news agencies such as the Telegraph (“But last year, just 48 per cent of the estimated badger population in west Somerset was culled by a combination of shooting and trapping animals, and just 39 per cent in Gloucestershire”)1, the Guardian(“In Somerset, 65% of the badger population was killed while in Gloucestershire the figure was 40%”)2 and the Conversation (“…cull teams only managed to kill between 28% and 48%. Culling periods were extended, but still the total kill rose to only something between 31% and 56%...”) all reporting different statistics for the first well organised and reported cull, what kind of information will we get from this new version. The move by the government to dispense with scientific advice means that the public will now only get information from partisan sides, further polarizing opinions. Even if this culling policy is effective, which seems unlikely, this current scheme makes it impossible for scientists, the public or policy makers to ever know.
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