THE push for electronic tagging of sheep has won a big supporter - the Bendigo saleyards.
While the council-owned centre has not yet agreed to implement the technology, a working group has been formed to draw up a template for its introduction.
Nationally, the sheep industry maintains the existing tracking system of visual tags and hand-written National Vendor Declarations could work with more resources. It says the system could track sheep and goats in the event of a serious disease outbreak.
But others - critical of what they say is an ineffective system - want to follow the cattle industry which introduced electronic tagging in the late 1990s.
It brought in electronic tagging in response to the infamous "cotton trash" residue incident in 1996 when cattle could not be accurately tracked.
The Bendigo group, which includes farmers, agents, council and saleyards staff, has decided to take the lead by preparing for the broader adoption of electronic sheep identification.
Bendigo saleyards manager Kerrie Crowley said the facility was keen to trial electronic scanning technology and find any pitfalls, in readiness for a broader adoption of electronic tagging.
"We think we can bring it in," Ms Crowley said.
"There's benefits for a range of people, even the truck drivers who will get a small benefit because they won't have to count stock - they will run past the scanner and the total will be displayed on the screen."
Ms Crowley was keen to integrate electronic vendor declarations into the plan, alleviating the need for truck drivers and agents to handle and process paper-based declaration forms.
She said trials at Bendigo had already shown 100 sheep could be scanned in 30 seconds and was more accurate than manual counting.
The Department of Primary Industry's Tony Britt congratulated the Bendigo saleyards for working to implement a system of scanning electronic tags for sheep which would ultimately limit the impact of any serious disease.
