An HGP is any veterinary medicine containing either natural or synthetic hormones sold for the purpose of increasing muscle tone, growth rate, weight gain or feed efficiency of animals.
The use of HGPs is not permitted in sheep in New Zealand and fewer than 1% of New Zealand beef cattle are treated with HGPs.
Use of HGPs is strictly controlled to protect New Zealand’s international trade in meat products. While international standards setting organisations and many markets, such as the USA and Australia, consider HGPs safe and use them extensively, the European Union (EU) and other countries have banned their use. Therefore, HGP use must be controlled and tracked so that meat from implanted animals can’t be exported to European or other markets where HGP is banned.
Animals that have been treated need to be identified on the animal status declaration (ASD) accompanying the movement of livestock and veterinarians must record the application of HGPs on the MPI database and apply a special HGP tag to the animal.
Find out more
Read about Using Hormonal Growth Promotants on the MPI website.