Section 18 – Breed Associations

From ICAR Wiki

Introduction

Preamble

Breed Associations or Herd Books as they may be known, are usually established to promote and develop a particular breed within a species. Their mission statement will usually include development of a breeding goal,  maintaining a herd book, and promotion through sales, media and events.

Purpose

The purpose of these Guidelines is to provide a standard framework for the development of a Breed Association and to define procedures and protocols that may be required.

Benefits

The benefits of standardising include:

  1. Ease of data exchange through using common and standard practices.
  2. Better understanding of the working of like organisations.
  3. To facilitate the movement of purebred animals internationally.

Scope

Figure 1 gives a pictorial summary of the main elements of this Breed Associations guideline.

Figure 1. Scope of this Breed Associations guideline.

The Breed Association Working Group

ICAR has established the Breeding Associations Working Group (BA-WG) with Terms of Reference as here, and membership as here on the ICAR web site. The BA-WG is responsible for the development of this guideline.

The Administration of Breed Association

The following topics are a frame work for administering a Breed Association. The topics are continually under review. Some may not be relevent to certain Breed Association, depending upon circumstances.

Corporate Structure

  1. The Breed Association may be set up as not for profit, a charity, an incorporated body or a limited company.
  2. The Constitution and Articles of Association determine the membership structure, membership rules and operation of the organisation, including office holders, committees, meetings and voting requirements plus rights of members. They provide a foundation and continuity for running the Organisation and have influence on governance, financial and legal responsibilities.
  3. By-laws, rules and regulations should cover operation and procedures around registration and traceability of animals for entry into the herd book.

Governance

  1. The ultimate responsibility of the Breed Association can be through a Board of Directors or Trustees, who are usually elected by the membership. The composition of this Board should be such that it includes a Chairperson and Vice Chairperson. A documented election process should be available.
  2. Most Breed Associations will have an Annual General Assembly where the members receive a report on the previous years’ work and they can question the Management and Directors of the Organisation.
  3. By-laws, rules and regulations should be available for employees and membership, these relate to operational issues.
  4. Breed Associations should get recognition by their country’s competent authority where relevant.

Management

  1. The management team running the Organisation should compose of a Chief Executive Officer or Herd Book Manager, together with officials responsible for areas such as finance, personnel, events and marketing.
  2. Employee safety should be a prime concern, and the Breed Association should have risk assessments for all procedures that could put employees at risk. Any health and safety policy should align with the national regulatory requirements.

Overseeing Organisations

  1. World Breed Organisations are responsible for defining and regulating breed specific goals and resolving breed specific issues. Appendix 1 contains a list World Breed Organisations with relevant contact information.
  2. ICAR acts as a conduit between World Breed Organisations, enabling them to exchange knowledge and discuss issues that span the breeds.

Funding

  1. Some Breed Associations may have full or part Governmental financial assistance. Others may solely depend upon membership subscriptions and commercial funding.

Membership

  1. The main membership of the Organisation is the breeders. The Breed Association should maintain a list of members and associated data, while adhering to the National and International data protection legislation as appropriate.
  2. Grades of membership may include ‘full’, ‘associate’, ‘life’, ‘youth’.
  3. In Breed Associations where animals are named, members can choose a prefix to use as branding for their herd. In most instances the prefix is used as part of the animals’ name when registered and appears on their Zootechnical certificates. The prefix should be unique to one breeder within the Association.

Services / sales / activities

  1. Breed Associations can offer a range of sales and services pertinent to their Breed and Country.  Sales and Services may include, but are not limited to, the registration of pedigree animals, classification, youth activities, awards and competitions etc.
  2. The Breed Association should maintain a sales ledger for invoicing members for services and membership fees.
  3. There may be development of Youth activities including stock judging and calf shows.
  4. To enable the membership of a Breed Association to maintain communication with the Directors and management, a Club/Branch structure may be set up.

Breed Association Procedure and Protocols

Animal Registration

  1. Registration process
    • Animals tendered for registration should be from members of the Breed Association, whether solely or jointly owned.
    • Animals that are tendered for registration in the main and supplementary sections of the herd book should in general be bred by the member registering them, unless they are already registered in another herd book. The identity of the other herdbook and the animal identifier from the other herd book should also be recorded (as a cross reference for data exchange)
    • If animals are registered in another herd book the manner of importation of genetics should be noted – animal, semen, embryo.
    • If a member buys a non-registered animal then depending upon the constitution of the Breed Association or their Country, they may be able to register the animal under their own prefix.
    • DNA parentage may be used to verify the parentage of animals tendered for registration, at the discretion of the individual Breed Association.
    • The Directors of the Breed Association have the right to prevent entry of animals into the herd book or at their discretion remove animals from the herd book.
    • When registered the animal should be assigned unique identification number. In many countries this number will be assigned by the national competent authority, thus making it unique.
  2. Supplementary Registrations / Recording
    • There may be a register of animals that are not pure bred.
    • There may be more than one register for non-pure bred animals.
    • Animals in the Supplementary registers must be of the breed type and have between 50% and 87.5 % pure breed genes depending upon the percentage of animal purity.
    • Breed Associations should check the rules of their countries with regard to additional Herd books. For example the EU and other areas will have additional legislative rules regarding breed purity.
  3. Multiple births
    • Animals born of a multiple birth should be notified to the Breed Association at the time of registration, stating the sex and identification number(s) of the other animal(s).
  4. Embryo Transfers
    • Embryo transfers should be recorded when a resulting animal is registered, and noted on the animals’ Zootechnical certificate.
    • It is advised that animals resulting from Embryo transfer have parentage verification due to the risk of incorrect parentage, and the high genetic value of the resultant animal.
    • Ideally a system for tracking embryo transfers should be implemented, including sire and dam, flushing dates, implantation dates, thus ensuring that the embryos from a flush can be tracked from dam insemination to young on the ground.
    • Animals from split embryos may be registered and noted as such.
  5. Genetic Traits
    • Genetic traits may be breed specific, may be recessive or dominant, and may have a deleterious or a desirable effect. They should be recorded and communicated on Zootechnical certificates and fact sheets so that they can be taken into account when mating. For guidelines on breed specific genetic traits, refer to the breeds’ World Breed Organisation.
  6. Clones
    • Breed Associations should check the rules of their countries with regard to allowing clones or progeny of cloned animals in the herd book. For example the majority of European Breed Associations will not register animals from Cloned sires.
    • Where progeny of clones or their offspring are registered, they should be recorded as such in the herd book and should appear on the Zootechnical certificate.
  7. Genetically modified animals
    • Breed Associations should check the rules of their countries with regard to allowing gene-edited animals in the herd book.
    • If an animal has been gene edited it should be recorded against the animal when registered and should appear on the Zootechnical Certificate.

Recording of Ownership

  1. Animals’ change of ownership should be recorded, together with the date of transfer from one breeder to another.
  2. Change of ownership is used when verifying birth events, leading to registration of animals.

Animal Inspection/Classification

  1. Linear Type Classification is a widely used method to assess and compare bovine animals within breed.
  2. Linear scoring is found mostly in Dairy Breeds. Type evaluation proofs can be calculated from the linear traits scored on first calvers. These proofs can then be used in mating programs when choosing sires. Older animals may be classified under the rules of the Breed Association and are awarded a final score.
  3. For a complete understanding of the methodology around animal conformation recording for dairy cattle, beef cattle, dual purpose cattle and dairy goats refer to the Section 5 of the ICAR Guidelines here.

Parentage Verification

  1. For a complete understanding of the options currently available for parentage verification, refer to the ICAR DNA Working Group here and Section 4 of the ICAR Guidelines.

Quality Control

a.       ICAR provides its members with a certificate of quality (CoQ) service which includes Breed Association activities.  Guidelines for this service are available here and information on accessing the service is available here.

Appendices

Appendix 1 – List of World Breed Associations

No. Name Website ICAR Member
1 World Holstein Friesian Federation [1](http://www.whff.info) Yes
2 World Guernsey Cattle Federation [2](https://www.worldguernseys.com) Yes
3 World Jersey Cattle Bureau [3](http://www.worldjerseycattle.com) Yes
4 Charolais International [4](https://www.charolaisinternational.com)
5 World Simmental Fleckvieh Federation [5](http://wsff.info)
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