HUGE increases in the incidence bovine tuberculosis have proved another setback for farmers in Worcestershire and Herefordshire, and industry chiefs are demanding action.

Andrew Goodman, county chairman of the NFU, says something had to be done to stop the increase in incidents around the UK - which have almost doubled since last year - starting with looking at badgers as a possible cause.

"We need to know what is going on and what is causing this massive increase in TB," he said.

"Badgers have been found to carry TB and in some instances, where they have been in contact with cattle, they too have contracted the disease."

Mr Goodman, of Walsgrove Farm, Great Witley, has lost 25 cattle to TB in the last 18 months and during that time the two counties has been pinpointed as a high risk area.

"Quite a few other farms have been affected in Worcestershire and the problem is even more serious in Herefordshire," he said.

"It's been a long-term problem and it needs a solution.

"The experiment is part of the debate over the Krebs report, and there will be no quick or easy answer. I do not advocate killing badgers for the sake of it but if they are found to infect animals by this DEFRA study, then action has to be taken."

Previous culling was disrupted by foot-and-mouth disease, but the scheme has resumed to gather data for a final Government report on badgers' role in spreading Bovine TB.

"From my point of view action has to be taken," said John Ballard, a cattle farmer in Shrawley, Worcestershire.

"Left unchecked, bovine TB can stagnate a farm, and if badgers cause it we need to know."

What Defra hopes to achieve

THE role of badgers in the spread of bovine TB is still unknown, but experts hope the culling trial will provide the answers.

One of the 10 areas in the country in which badgers will be culled is Bosbury, near Ledbury.

It is not known how badgers spread TB to cattle, but they remain prime suspects because they are only one of a few animals that can carry the disease.

"We know badgers suffer from TB and the study will address the link between the two," said a spokeswoman for the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, which is running the study.

"Badger setts are also often in farmland areas."

Researchers hope the Randomised Badger Culling Trial should establish how the disease is passed from one animal to another and the route it takes, for example, by air, faeces or urine.

The study works by comparing how the disease spreads in areas where badgers have been entirely eradicated, partly culled and left alone.

Defra has defended the need to kill the badgers rather than study them live or move them, as there is no effective test to identify TB infection in live badgers, and moving setts would have these territorial animals competing for the same food and fighting each other.

'Poor hygiene is real problem'

Clare Whyte, a member of the Coalition of Badger Action Groups (CBAG), is convinced the blame for bovine TB lies with the Government and farmers.

"Bovine TB is spreading around the country, but not because of badgers," she said.

"Farmers are not sticking to Defra's guidelines and many are not following the correct hygiene and bio-security measures.

"There were major restrictions on cattle movement after foot-and-mouth and in many cases they have been ignored. That is why there has been an increase in incidents of bovine TB recently.

"And it is now a political problem because so much time and money has been spent blaming badgers it has become impossible for the Government to admit they are wrong."

It costs Defra more than £30,000 to trap each badger that carries the disease, CBAG claims.

"When you consider farms that are struggling won't earn that in years it is a ludicrous sum," said the Hereford-based activist.

"But wherever Defra try and capture badgers, we will have someone there to release them.

"In the short term, we are just trying to save the badgers' lives. But in the long term, all culling has to stop because, despite their experiments and all the animals they have killed, TB in cattle has not decreased at all."

The links between badgers and bovine TB were first mentioned in the early 1970s, when cattle in Gloucester were believed to have contracted the disease.

However, the Government's badger culls have only been a high profile issue since the Krebs report was published - stating badgers were a "significant source of infection" - in 1997.

Since then, activists have tried to sabotage the experiment by moving badgers from designated areas, leading many to question the value of information collected.