January 30, 2004

 

 

Pakistan Urged To Lift Ban On Internal Chicken Transportation

 

The Pakistani government has been urged by the Poultry Association of Pakistan (PAP) to lift the ban on the inter-provincial transportation of chickens, as huge costs amounting to billions of rupees would be incurred.

 

Convener PAP, Abdul Maroof Siddiqui on Thursday disclosed that the PAP has written a letter to the federal government in this regard since this decision, "would adversely affect the poultry industry of the country".

 

He believed that the decision of inter-provincial ban on chicken movement was perhaps taken in haste, since "the situation is not all that bad these days". There have been no more mortalities of layer chickens due to spread of influenza H-7 and H-9 - last time reported on December 22, 2003, he added.

 

Siddiqui pointed that timely vaccination in layer farms has stopped the spreading of any more influenza in the birds.

 

He said that culling of chickens was not a solution to the deadly virus that had re-appeared in birds in countries like America, Hong Kong and Mexico where mass scale culling was employed as a preventive method against the epidemic.

 

The convener of PAP was of the view that this ban would adversely affect the sale of broiler birds too that had no symptom of influenza H-7 and H-9.

 

He mentioned that about 1.6 to 1.7 million broilers had been reared in and around Hub Chowki within the past 6 to 7 weeks. The birds produced in this area were mostly consumed in Karachi. However, due to the inter-provincial ban on chicken movement, chicken farmers would suffer huge loss since Hub Chowki falls within the jurisdiction of Balochistan, he said.

 

Siddiqui pointed that the epidemic has claimed 3.5 to 4 million layers worth Rs700 million to Rs800 million. Insurance companies do not provide insurance cover to poultry farms so there remained no chance of compensation on their behalf, he added.

 

When asked if affected birds used in bird feed might also affect healthy birds, he disclosed that only producers of Animal Protein Concentrates (APC) use such birds in their plants after burning it at a temperature of 300 degree centigrade; it needs just 60 centigrade to kill influenza H-7 and H-9, he added.

 

As soon as layer birds - reared for egg production - gets affected by the virus, it stops laying eggs. Hence there are no chances of transfer of this virus through eggs, Siddiqui said while responding to a query.

 

The Vice President of Karachi Wholesale Poultry Association (KWPA), M Mushtaq Awan, when contacted, said he was surprised that some countries had banned chicken import from Pakistan when the country was itself a chicken importer rather than an exporter.