October 1, 2008

 

 

Authorities in Togo have reported that some 17,000 birds have died or have been culled since the outbreak of the H5N1 bird flu virus on 9 September on three poultry farms.

 

The farms were in Agbata, located 10km east of Lome, according to the country's livestock director, Komla Batawui.

 

The UN Food and Agricultural Organization adviser to the government, Jacques Conforti, says the risk, which is mainly in free-range poultry, has been contained.

 

Conforti says the disinfection has moved along quickly in the past three weeks,

 

He says officials meet with farmers who point out any sick birds, cull the birds, and pay the farmers for the value of the bird, eggs or bird feed that is destroyed.

 

Officials have paid close to US$9,000 so far in compensation.

 

Following the West African country's first outbreak of the virus in August 2007, the World Bank had pushed for farmer payments to encourage quick and accurate reporting, but had also cautioned officials about the difficulty of creating a fair and transparent payment programme to prevent fraudulent claims.

 

Olga Jonas, the World Bank adviser who coordinates donor avian flu funding, had said payment schemes can be difficult to carry out because it can be hard to prove ownership for small producers in remote areas who live in the bush.

 

But Togo's livestock director, Batawui, said there was no room for bird fraud as farmers would have to show authorities their dead poultry to make claims.

 

Following the last outbreak, Togolese officials requested international donor assistance; the US$500,000 requested has just now arrived from European Union, African Union, African Development Bank, Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and World Bank.

 

Half of this money will go toward interventions at the farm-level, such as disinfecting farms, culling, and incinerating birds, while the other half is to be spent on training and equipment to help officials respond to and contain the spread.