Paraban

Paraban is driven by the Scottish Cattle Industry's concern about the increasing prevalence of Johne's Disease in the national herd.

The Paraban project used knowledge exchange (KE) to identify feasible best practices for the monitoring and control of paratuberculosis (Johne’s disease) on Scottish cattle farms.

The project established an effective communication network between 'champion farms', their vets, health schemes, members of the Industry and scientists to identify the best testing and management options for the control of paratuberculosis on a farm-by-farm basis. This network enabled the best available knowledge from those involved in paratuberculosis control, from farmer and vet to scientists and industry, to be utilised in a realistic and effective manner, whilst workable solutions were tried and monitored for each farm.

It was a 3 year project funded by the Scottish Funding Council with additional funding provided directly from Scottish Government. In-kind support was provided by Quality Meat Scotland (QMS) and other industry stakeholders.

The project was led by the Epidemiology Research Unit (SRUC Research) in Inverness with project partners from the Universities of Glasgow and Edinburgh and the James Hutton Institute.

Over the course of January 2014 to March 2015, "Paraban Reloaded" delivered a series of 21 workshops across Scotland in order to:

• Provide information to farmers enabling them to understand the benefits of testing for Johne's disease
• Show farmers, through the use of case studies, the benefits of testing
• Provide for farmers, a risk-based decision support tool which uses a combination of farm management and environmental information

The workshops were designed to engage farmers in discussion and highlight the management options that they could consider implementing in an attempt to better control Johne's Disease.