Quote:
Originally Posted by muldonach  Also the figure paid out in compensation is by no means the entire cost of a breakdown. Bourne put the average cost of a breakdown at £27,000 with costs split 70:30 taxpayer:farmer affected. He`also noted that other parties had refused to develop an average figure since there was such a wide variation. |
Also from the final RBCT report:
the total financial benefit of reduced TB breakdowns was costed at £313,200 per 100Km2 (@ £27K per breakdown) whereas the cost of culling was £1,425,000 per Km2, assuming 75% land access and a five year cull (pg 158) - a ratio of over 4:1 cost:benefit. Even if gassing rather than cage trapping was used, the cost:benefit would be 3:1 (based on a cost of £2,400/Km2 for gassing). This does not include edge effects. If you include those, the cost-benefit is much much worse. Thus it makes no economic sense. It would be much cheaper to compensate farmers properly and to deal with the disease in cattle.
Also - the Dunnet report showed the costs of culling (gassing) in the 1970s-1980s to be £10m for a benefit of £2m - a 5:1 ratio. Thus the cost of culling seems to greatly outweigh the benefits.