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Executive Summary March - May 2018

March - May 2018

This document contains a summary of the relevant information and decisions of the Interbull Steering Committee meetings as well as of other meetings that were held during the period March-May 2018.

Animal Identification

Correct identification of animals is critical to get the best national and international genetic evaluations. Incorrect, and inconsistent use of breed code ‘RED’ and ‘HOL’ for Holstein, and country code ‘USA’ and ‘840’ for animals born in the USA have created animal ID conflicts, leading to suboptimal genetic evaluations. The Interbull SC has decided to support:

1. A proposal by the ICAR ID Subcommittee that addresses the use of both alphabetical and numerical Country codes (specifically USA/840, but also CAN/124), and
2. Plans developed by the Interbull Centre and a number of country representatives, to address the issues arising due to the use of Breed code ‘RED’ for red Holstein.

Implementation plans will be made available to the Interbull Community ahead of the Technical Workshop in August 2018. It is the intention to introduce the RED/HOL changes for the September 2018 test run, and the USA/840 changes for the January 2019 Test Run.

From the December 2018 Routine Run onwards:

1. The use of ‘RED’ will be eliminated, and both red and black Holstein cattle will be identified with breed code as ‘HOL’.
2. All RED breed codes will be converted to HOL.

3. The HOL red type information will be preserved through the IDEA-AnimInfo, and this information will be distributed with each run, so that ‘Red Holstein’ lists can still be produced by individual countries wishing to do so.

From the April 2019 Routine Run onwards:

The country code ‘USA’ will only be accepted for USA-born animals with ID <3 billion.
Only the country code ‘840’ will be accepted for USA-born animals with ID >3 billion.

Interbull Service Calendar 2018 and 2019

The Interbull Service Calendar is scheduled well in advance so that national evaluation centres and the Interbull Centre can plan their activities accordingly. The SC has considered a request for a change to the schedule that will help with this planning, while respecting the release date schedules as specified in the Interbull Code of Practice. For the rest of the 2018 official evaluation Interbull Centre will pre-release GMACE and InterGenomics evaluation results one day earlier than scheduled IF no issues arise during the evaluation. The service calendar for 2019 onwards will be changed so that submission of GEBV (and files 733 and 734) and the GMACE and InterGenomics pre-release will happen one day earlier. Such changes will be highlighted in the 2019 calendar which will soon be made available online.

Launch of SNP-based Services

• Following a successful pilot run in QTR 1/2018, where four ICAR members’ centres successfully went through the application process, ICAR announced and officially released the SNP-based Parentage Verification Accreditation Service for DNA Data Interpretation Centres on 7 May 2018. The Interbull Centre provides the technical details during the application process.

• ICAR accredited DNA Data Interpretation Centres are eligible for subscription to the Parentage SNP Exchange Service (“GenoEx-PSE”), which has been established at the Interbull Centre and which was officially launched effective 1 June 2018.

• GenoEx-PSE details are available on www.interbull.org/ib/genoex_pse and genoex.org.

Interbull Centre Service Delivery

With the introduction of a new range of services related to SNP data, and in a continuous effort to improve the delivery of services from the Interbull Centre, Service Owners as listed in the table below have been appointed for all services. The Service Owners report to the Interbull Centre Director.

SNP Services include:

1. ICAR DNA Data Interpretation centre Accreditation

2. Parentage SNP Exchange (GenoEx-PSE)

Interbull Governance

Steering Committee Membership

At the ICAR Board meeting held on 27 March 2018, it was duly moved, seconded and carried that the mandate of a renewed 4-year term for Sophie Mattalia as a member of the Interbull Steering Committee, was approved.

Interbull Meetings in 2018

Joint Interbull-ADSA Symposium at ADSA annual meeting (24-27 June 2018)(Knoxville, Tennessee, USA)

The programme for the Interbull-ADSA Symposium on Phenotyping and genetics in the New Era of sensor data from automation is available on www.interbull.org/ib/2018_joint_interbull_adsa_symp.

Registration and further details on www.adsa.org/2018/program.

2018 Interbull Technical Workshop in Dubrovnik, Croatia: 25 and 26 August 2018

The 2018 Interbull Technical Workshop in Dubrovnik will focus on the development of Interbull Services, including “SNPMace”, “InterGenomics-Holstein”, “Mendelian Sampling Test” and “Genomic Reliability”. Further details and registration are available on: www.interbull.org/ib/2018_technical_workshop

Joint Interbull-EAAP session at the EAAP meeting in Dubrovnik, Croatia: 27-31 August 2018

EAAP and Interbull will once again organise joint sessions on the first day of EAAP:

• Cow genotyping for genomic selection, management and marketing in cattle

• Optimization of a genomic breeding program for small-sized cattle populations

More info on www.eaap2018.org and www.interbull.org/ib/2018_eaap.

Interbull Annual Meetings

• 2019, Cincinnati, Ohio, USA (with ADSA): 22-24 June 2019

• 2020, Leeuwarden, The Netherlands (with ICAR): Interbull Meeting dates tbc

• 2021, Davos, Switzerland (with EAAP): 28-30 August 2021

Publications:

Papers of the 2018 Interbull Meetings in Auckland are now available in Interbull Bulletin Issue 53: https://journal.interbull.org/index.php/ib/issue/view/76