January 26, 2004

 

 

Thai Poultry Industry Hard Hit By Bird Flu Outbreak

 

Thailand's chicken exports will pick up again, but only when the current outbreak of bird flu in the country can be contained, according to government officials and industry participants Friday.

 

Thai Deputy Agriculture Minister Newin Chidchob confirmed Friday that the bird flu virus has been discovered in chickens in the central province of Suphanburi, and said testing was continuing in other areas. Also Friday, the Thai government said two young boys had contracted the disease.

 

"Our chicken exports are facing a problem now...our exports will be back to normal only when we can contain the situation," said Chaveevan Kampa, president of the Poultry Promotion Association of Thailand, which is under the Patronage of His Majesty the King.

 

"We have to try to assure our customers that chicken exports (in the future) will be free of any diseases", Chaveevan said. She added that the process of restoring consumer confidence in chicken shouldn't take "a long time".

 

Japan, Thailand's largest chicken buyer, announced Thursday a temporary suspension in imports of Thai chicken meat because of fears over bird flu. The European Union, Thailand's second largest chicken market, followed suit Friday, banning poultry imports from Thailand. Bangladesh has also banned the import of live chickens from seven Asian countries including Thailand.

 

Newin said earlier Friday that chicken exports will be hurt by the bird flu outbreak only in the short term as the disease will be contained soon. He said the ministry is working to eliminate the disease and expects the situation will soon be brought under control.

 

"The effect (of bird flu on Thai chicken exports) should last only in the first quarter this year. (Exports) will pick up in the second half of the year," Newin said.

 

Thailand, the world's forth largest chicken exporter after the U.S., Brazil and China, exported 540,000 tons of chicken worth around 54 billion baht ($1=THB39.027) in 2003, up from 464,243 tons in 2002. Before the outbreak of bird flu, the country expected this year to export 630,000 tons of chicken worth around THB70 billion.

 

Commerce Minister Wattana Muangsook said ministry officials are talking to Japanese authorities to persuade them to allow imports of certain chicken products considered safe to consume, such as steamed chicken. The disease isn't transmitted from cooked chicken or eggs.

 

"Once the chicken situation is solved, exports will pick up, maybe at a fast pace as Thai chickens are believed to be of better quality compared with some other origins," Wattana said.

 

In an attempt to contain any spread of the disease to newborn chickens, chicken raisers have halved their chick output to 11 million chicks a week from the usual 22 million, Chaveevan said.

 

She said chicken raisers should maintain the output cut for another three weeks to help contain the disease.

 

Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said earlier Friday that any bird flu outbreak would be contained within a month and that the government has already treated the problem as if it were bird flu even though it wasn't sure.

 

So far, more than 6 million chickens have been killed to prevent the spread of disease, which the Thai government earlier claimed was cholera and bronchitis instead of bird flu.

 

Chaveevan said the outbreak won't impact only the chicken industry, but will have a knock-on effect on the feedstuff industry.

 

"The lower chicken population will result in decreased demand and imports of feed meal," she said.

 

Thailand is a net importer of soybean and soymeal. It is expected to have imported a total of around 3.3 million tons of these two commodities in 2003.