The objectives of the Act are:

1. Provide for powers to make Regulations on areas that recent EU Regulations on veterinary medicines left to be determined by national law;
2. Provide for the introduction of a National Veterinary Prescription System (NVPS); and
3. Repeal the Animal Remedies Act 1993 and modernise the legislation that governs the veterinary medicine area.

The development and introduction of the NVPS, which will be done by a Commencement Order in the coming months, supports Ireland’s ambition to continue improving customer online digital services in line with the Government’s National Digital Strategy and will provide greater assurance to our national and international trading partners and customers through greater regulatory oversight of Ireland’s agri-food production sector.

Additional benefits of the system will be:

1. To provide farmers with much greater choice — they can choose to purchase their veterinary medicinal products VMPs from any authorised dispenser (a pharmacist, licenced merchant, feed mill or another veterinary dispenser);
2. To reduce the administrative burdens for those prescribing, dispensing, and purchasing VMPs;
3. To simplify record keeping for those purchasing VMPs;
4. To provide greater regulatory oversight of those involved in the general prescribing/dispensing/use of VMPs, protecting those parties who are meeting their regulatory functions;
5. To provide a deeper understanding of the current processes being used to prescribe, dispense, and treat food producing animals and the VMPs being used. This will enable better evidence-informed policy development, helping Ireland to address both the growing antimicrobial and antiparasitic resistance issues;
6. To improve controls, enhancing confidence among trading partners in Irish exported live animals, including equines, and agri-food products; and
7. To meet Ireland’s EU commitment in submitting annual veterinary medicinal usage for information purposes in the global battle against antimicrobial resistance.

This Act will, going forward, contribute to addressing the key One Health One Welfare societal challenge of Antimicrobial Resistance as well as Antiparasitic Resistance.