AS highlighted in The Irish Field last week, the Irish Equine Centre [IEC] won three awards at the 2018 Irish Laboratory Awards.

The Irish Laboratory Awards is the premier event in Ireland to highlight excellence, best practice and innovation in Ireland’s laboratories.

Entrants are drawn from all aspects of scientific disciplines such as human medicine, pharmaceutical research, food science, engineering and animal health.

Based in Johnstown, Co Kildare, the IEC was shortlisted for two awards – Veterinary Laboratory and Agricultural Laboratory of the Year – and was lucky enough to win both despite stiff competition.

For the final award of Commercial Laboratory of the Year, the judges shortlisted six winners from the various category winners and ultimately chose the IEC as the overall winner.

The judges stated that the IEC’s activities in equine diagnostics, disease research and surveillance, product innovation, education and support of the Irish equine industry merited the overall award.

IEC chief executive Sarah McNicholas commented: “I am incredibly proud of the three awards we won at the Irish Laboratory Awards this year and the recognition they confer on every member of the IEC team.

“Our hope was to win one of the categories we were shortlisted for, but to win both and then receive the overall award of Commercial Laboratory of the Year was a wonderful outcome. It’s particularly special as we were judged by a heavyweight panel of experts and assessed against companies across a range of scientific disciplines.

“The awards are a significant vote of confidence in the hard-working and highly skilled team at the IEC who work to ensure equine and animal health is continually maintained and improved. The veterinary and scientific expertise at the IEC is world-class and is there for the benefit of every owner, breeder, trainer and farmer.”

These awards come at a time when the IEC and its current facilities are the subject of much discussion within the industry. A significant redevelopment of the original building is badly needed and McNicholas is hopeful that these awards will convince industry stakeholders that an investment in the IEC is strategic to the future of the Irish equine and farming industries and would be money well spent.

“We have comprehensively demonstrated that the IEC is a scientific centre of excellence that deserves to be supported and upgraded for the future,” McNicholas said.