Pembrokeshire’s experiment with badgers

The eve of the Pembrokeshire Show is a good moment to explore the most bitterly contested issue that has dominated farming in recent years. I’m raising, of course, what to do about badgers and their infecting cattle with TB. I confess that when I took part in hustings in Preseli on behalf of Plaid Cymru in the general election earlier this year this was the question I dreaded most, because there is no straightforward answer.

I’m deeply sympathetic to the plight of farmers whose herds become infected with TB. It is a devastating experience, both financially and emotionally. But I’ve never been persuaded that culling badgers is the answer. It’s not because I have a sentimental attitude towards these attractive-looking creatures who feature so prominently in the story books of small children. If I was persuaded that culling worked, then reluctantly I would support it.

But all the evidence I’ve managed to gather persuades me that culling has the opposite effect of what is intended. As Mike Joseph, a writer based near Fishguard who has investigated the impact of culling has argued, killing badgers creates chaos in their lives. The territorial systems of this most social of animals break down. Badgers that survive a cull range more widely. Meanwhile, badgers from neighbouring areas move in to colonise newly-culled territory. Confrontations and fighting result from the breakdown of stable territories, increasing injuries and infection. Along the cull area boundary, and for some considerable distance beyond it, the rate of badger TB increases. And that results in more cattle being put at risk and more being infected. So any benefits of reduced transmission at the heart of a cull area, are offset by increased transmission around the perimeter.

Fortunately, some years ago the Welsh government acknowledged this reality. Instead of culling they began a five-year experiment to establish whether vaccinating badgers is the answer. We are now three years into the scheme and so far about 4,000 doses of vaccine have been administered to badgers that have been trapped in north Pembrokeshire. The so-called intensive action area covers about 288 sq km along the coast just north of, but mainly to the south, of the Teifi where it is estimated there are around 300 main badger setts.

It is an expensive business that will cost about £5m over the five years. And we won’t know until the five years are up whether it has been successful. But the fact is that any option for dealing with TB in cattle is expensive. Doing nothing would be the most expensive option. In the first four months of this year alone, 11,000 cattle were slaughtered across the UK because of TB.

Culling badgers is continuing in England and likely to prove counter-productive. Meanwhile, in Wales a range of other measures are accompanying our vaccination experiment. In particular, every herd of cattle across the country is tested for TB every 12 months, and infected cattle dealt with immediately. At the same time farmers at risk are being helped with a range of measures to separate their cattle from contact with badgers. The result is that over the last five years the numbers of cattle in Wales being slaughtered because of TB has been reduced by 45 per cent and 94 per cent of our herds are now TB-free.