Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many Animal Health Certificates (a) have been issued in each of the last five years and (b) his Department has estimated will need to be issued in each year between 2022 and 2026 inclusive; and if he will make a statement.

For the purposes of the EU Pet Travel Scheme, Great Britain and the Crown Dependencies are considered a Part 2 listed third country which requires an Animal Health Certificate (AHC) for pet travel to the EU and Northern Ireland (NI). AHCs are issued for a maximum of five pets.

The Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA) does not issue the actual AHCs but provides Unique Certificate Numbers (UCNs) to Official Veterinarians (OVs), on request, which they then use to issue individual AHCs to their clients.

APHA has issued 38 batches of UCNs (with 50 UCNs in each batch) to OVs since 1 January 2022 to date, allowing for approximately 1,900 AHCs to be issued by vets. Prior to 1 January 2022, AHCs were not required to enter the EU and NI with UK pet passports being issued instead, so the number of AHCs issued for previous years is zero.

APHA is unable to estimate the number of AHCs which will need to be issued in each year between 2022 to 2026 inclusive. APHA has been issuing UCNs since 1 January 2022 so does not have previous year trends to estimate figures, and with the uncertainty of the Covid-19 pandemic it is difficult to predict future numbers.