CLA - Movements - Glossary

Holding CPH

A ‘holding’ is the land and buildings that are used to house livestock. CPH (County Parish Holding) is a unique identifier that refers to a holding. Every holding that keeps livestock must obtain a CPH number from the Rural Payments Agency. The CPH is a 9-digit number (e.g. 12/345/6789). The first 2 digits relate to the county, the next 3 relate to the parish, and the last 4 digits identify the holding.

Holding MHS

A 4-digit number that is usually assigned to an Abattoir by the Meat Hygiene Service. Commonly known as an MHS number, this can be used as an alternative to a CPH when recording livestock movements to an abattoir.

Dates and Times

Dates and times are represented in the CLA interface as .NET DateTimeOffset objects.

String representation of the date time is ISO8601 and the format string is:

where

• yyyy – 4-digit year
• MM – 2-digit month
• dd – 2-digit day
• HH – 2-digit hour
• mm – 2-digit minutes
• ss – 2-digit seconds
• K – The time zone. The format is [+/-]hz:mz
• hz – time zone hours difference from UTC
• mz – time zone minutes difference from UTC

Note: UTC can be expressed as either using the character 'Z' or +00:00

Tag Numbers

Tag numbers are a unique identifier used for individual animals.

For sheep and goats, the Tag number format starts with the letters UK, followed by either 0 or 1, then 6 digits, an optional space, then 5 more digits

Valid examples are:

• UK0123456 12345
• UK012345612345

Radio Frequency Identifier (RFID)

The RF_ID (or RFID) is the ‘Radio Frequency Identifier’ and is the unique number returned by an RFID reader when an electronic tag is read.

CLA can accept RF_ID value in HEX, Decimal and UK WYSIWYG format.

Valid examples are:

• 8200ce82dfdae801
• 0826012345612345
• UK012345612345
• UK0123456 12345

Batch Numbers

A batch is used to denote a flock or herd of animals in a movement record, rather than individuals.

A batch can be defined as:

where <I.D. Mark> and <StockType> are both optional.

Examples of this are shown below:

• UK999999 x 2 (Blue),
• UK999999 x 2 (Blue – Total Sheep),
• UK999999 x 2

For movements relating to sheep and goats, a valid batch number always begins with the characters 'UK' and is followed by 6 digits.

Where a batch number is unknown, the reserved valued 'unknown' can be used. This value is case-insensitive; 'UNKNOWN', 'unknown' and Unknown' will all be accepted.

Devices

A tag attached to an animal is a 'Device'.

A key concept of CLA is that a 'tag upload' is the act of registering a tag and a 'device application' is the act of attaching a tag to an animal. A 'tag number' is the actual number of the tag, and so applies regardless of whether the tag is attached to an animal or not.

Tag numbers used in movements must be known to the system in some capacity.

Processing Flags

Some endpoints include one or more Processing Flags attributes that are used to modify how a request is validated and processed.

Exemption Codes on a movement are an example of ProcessingFlags usage. Specifying an Exemption Code in the ProcessingFlags entry of a livestock movement changes the validation behaviour to accept a movement, where a movement without an Exemption Code would otherwise be rejected.

Any Processing Flags values supplied as part of the movement record are stored within the system as pertaining to that movement. It is important, therefore that the submitter of the movement is certain that any ProcessingFlags values supplied are applicable to the livestock movement they are attached to.