Inspections underway, starting soon or paused
Non-farm Inspections
Inspections / investigations currently underway include:
NIEA
- Any reported incidents where there is a risk to human health or serious risk to the environment;
- Incidents of fly tipping assessed as having the potential to be a high or medium risk;
- Administrative inspections of waste movements;
- Regulation of NI Water in relation to drinking water quality;
- Regulation of private water supply sites through the risk management process;
- Targeted surveillance and inspections in identified higher risk locations with the potential to impact on drinking water supplies;
- Compliance sampling for the construction of the A6;
- Investigation of significant water pollution incidents;
- Incidents of a serious nature relating to dangerous wild animals, wildlife crime, and invasive species and damage to protected sites.
Marine and Fisheries
- Satellite fishing vessel monitoring and vessel logging in harbours;
- Live fish movement certification scheme;
- Inspections of glass eel imports;
- Potential breaches of marine licenses;
- Inspection of marine protected sites;
- Response to medium or high severity fish kills;
- Logging vessels in harbours to verify lost fishing opportunity;
- Recreational fisheries inspections;
- Public angling estate inspections;
VSAHG
- Animal by-products establishment inspections (renderers etc);
- Artificial Reproduction Controls and inspections
- National Residue Control plan sampling for meat, milk and eggs;
- Sampling of C1 seed for certification;
- Inspections on raw cow drinking milk producers;
- Reactive follow up work to antibiotic failures;
- Collection of NI radioactivity surveillance plan samples by milk processors;
- Inspection and sampling of imported animal feeds
- Meat official controls;
- Beef and Pork carcase classification checks;
- Beef labelling checks;
- Egg Marketing Inspections;
- Risk based sanitary and phytosanitary portal inspections;
- Animal welfare including market and point of departure checks;
- Dairy inspections;
- Animal feed inspections, eg mills.
Forestry
- Essential forestry regulation inspections;
- Payment related forestry grant scheme inspections;
- Plant health inspections and regulatory response to serious pest threats in high risk import trade and outbreaks;
Inspections / investigations starting soon include:
NIEA
- Pollution Prevention and Control inspections;
- Control of Major Accidents and Hazards (COMAH) inspections;
- Some visits to support the determination of discharge consents;
- Programme of waste compliance monitoring;
- Routine inspection of waste industry sites;
- Routine Water Regulation inspections;
- Planned routine audits of NI Water sites;
- Routine inspections of private waste water discharges, abstractions and impoundment sites and compliance sampling for industrial consents;
- Compliance sampling for industrial consents;
- Routine monitoring of private water supplies;
Forestry
- Programme of Afforestation inspections;
VSAHG
- Food Business Operator & Third Country compliance audits in abattoirs and meat cutting plants;
- Animal welfare establishment inspections;
- Export Assembly Centre audits.
Routine inspections / investigations with continued pause include:
NIEA
- Radioactive substances inspections;
- Reports concerning alleged illegal waste disposal which have been assessed as low level and low risk.
- Routine inspections of waste water treatment works and waste water pumping stations (pending resolution of PPE / risk assessment due to aerosols)
- Routine oil and pesticide storage checks on industrial premises;
- Routine zoo and wildlife licence inspections;
Marine and Fisheries
- Routine inspections of fishing vessels at sea;
- Routine inspections relating to low severity fish kills;
- Investigations into low level reports of illegal fishing;
VSAHG
- Non-statutory RISK scheme sampling;
Forestry
- Low risk non-essential plant health, produce quality and pest inspections;
Farm Inspections
Inspections / investigations currently underway include:
- Any reported incidents where there is a risk to human health or serious risk to the environment, including high risk or high impact waste pollution or offending, or high or medium severity water pollution incidents;
EU Area Based Scheme Inspections
- Environmental Farming Scheme pre-approval checks;
- Young Farmer (YF) Scheme interviews (2019);
- Client Referral (CR1) checks;
- Cross compliance whistle blower reports.
VSAHG
- National Control programmes – Zoonoses & Residues;
- New herd or flock number applications;
- Scrapie monitored scheme application visits;
- NI Poultry Health Assurance Scheme visits;
- Brucellosis – Herd surveillance;
- Bovine TB surveillance – Herd testing, interferon gamma testing and TB breakdown mapping visits;
- Post import testing - includes Bluetongue and Maedi-Visna;
- Dairy farm inspections;
- Egg marketing Inspections;
- Sheep and cattle identification inspections
Inspections / investigations starting soon include:
NIEA
- Cross compliance inspections SMR 1 (nitrates and phosphates) at a reduced rate;
- Cross compliance inspections SMR2 and SMR3 ( Wild Birds and Semi –Natural Habitats respectively) at a reduced rate and where there can be continued adherence to social distancing requirements;
EU Area Based Schemes
- Full Environmental Farming Scheme inspections;
- Rapid Field Visits (RFVs) for the Basic Payment Scheme;
- New Business ID inspections;
VSAHG
- Other Animal Disease Surveillance, eg Sheep, goat & poultry survey, Enzootic Bovine Leukosis etc;
- Primary production hygiene inspections ;
- Scrapie Audits.
Routine inspections / investigations with continued pause include:
EU Area Based Schemes Inspections
- Hedge Mitigation;
- Young Farmer Scheme Interviews (2020);
VSAHG
- Brucellosis abattoir surveillance;
- Aujezsky’s disease surveillance.