July 5, 2006

Bird flu in South Africa raises worries over ostrich meat exports

An outbreak of bird flu in an South African ostrich plant has triggered worries over its R 2.2 billion (US$300 million) market.

The South African government is scrambling to implement measures after bird flu broke out at an ostrich farm near Mossel Bay.

The national and the Western Cape agriculture departments moved quickly to contain the outbreak.

The agriculture department said the H5N2 strain of bird flu affecting the farm was not the highly virulent strain that had triggered massive poultry culling in other countries.

South Africa is the world's top producer of ostrich meat with the EU as one of its major markets. South Africa has some 600 export-registered ostrich farms with roughly 300 000 ostriches slaughtered each year.

According to rules from the World Organisation for Animal Health, a country which has had an outbreak of the disease cannot export meat from the affected species for 21 days after the last reported case of the infection.

The national agriculture department said the outbreak was most likely limited to a single farm. All 60 ostriches on the farm were culled. The country's Animal Diseases Act allows the farmer to be fully compensated for losses.

Thousands of ostriches were culled in the Eastern Cape in 2004 after an outbreak of bird flu on two farms.