The Irish Cattle Breeding Federation (ICBF) is understood to be planning to release a weanling price trait index in the coming months.

A spokesperson for Teagasc told Agriland that such an index due in the autumn will reflect the weanling prices that a given cows weanlings have achieved.

It is understood that work on this new index is currently ongoing, however ICBF has yet to confirm any further details.

The Teagasc spokesperson added that there has also been a commitment to follow up with industry stakeholders to review whether the current approach to indexes is appropriate.

"Teagasc and ICBF will be engaging with industry stakeholders on this later in the autumn," they said.

As previously reported by Agriland, the ICBF confirmed that the next genetic evaluation will be published at the later date of September 2025.

ICBF said the new evaluations, initially expected in July, were delayed because of "the planned implementation of important upgrades to both the beef and dairy evaluations".

The federation said that the "scope and scale of the current changes designed to align with international best practices and enhance the value of genetic indexes require additional time for testing and implementation as well as industry collaboration."

ICBF typically issues six evaluations annually, spaced roughly every two months.

The federation said that all updates have been thoroughly reviewed and approved by both the Technical Advisory Group (TAG) and the ICBF Board.

The updates will see changes to both the beef and dairy evaluations.