NO AVIAN FLU. Evangeline Culpa, dressed chicken stall owner at the T. Padilla Public Market, welcomes the news that the ban on the entry of poultry products from Luzon has been lifted, as it also means that consumers in Cebu are now assured that they will be buying chicken safe from avian flu virus, particularly poultry products processed in Luzon.
CDN PHOTO/TONEE DESPOJO
Starting today, the ban to ship dressed chicken and other poultry products from Luzon to Visayas and Mindanao has been lifted.
Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol, speaking to reporters in Manila on Tuesday, said he will issue today a memorandum circular lifting the ban.
In a press conference with officials from the Department of Agriculture (DA), Piñol assured the public that poultry and other poultry products outside the 7-kilometer controlled zones of Pampanga and Nueva Ecija are safe to eat.
This means shipment within Luzon areas will also be allowed, provided that the products will come outside the controlled zones, and that measures will be followed by the operators.
All shipments must carry certifications and seals from quarantine officers, and “balut” eggs or duck eggs with embryo must be cooked before any movement.
But Dr. Miriam Lopez-Vito, quarantine officer of the Department of Agriculture in Central Visayas (DA-7), said that the shipment ban will still be in effect for products going inside Cebu and other parts of Central Visayas while the guidelines for shipping poultry products is still being drafted.
“We have yet to receive the full guidelines from our national office. As of now, we will be implementing the same procedures for the shipments coming from Luzon,” she told Cebu Daily News yesterday.
For the time being, Lopez-Vito said they will continue monitoring all the ports in Cebu to avoid the entry of poultry products from Luzon.
Piñol, on the other hand, said his order to lift the poultry ban was “based on the recommendation of our bio-security team and within the conformity of the National Meat Inspection Service (NMIS).”
Although the order was based on an objective assessment by experts, said Piñol, he admitted that there was also an “emotional consideration,” given the “pleadings of the farmers” to lift the ban because of the losses they have to incur that were increasing every day.
Huge losses
According to United Broiler Retailers Association (Ubra) president Bong Inciong, farm-gate prices for chickens already hit P15 per kilo to as low as P10 per kilo from the usual farm-gate price of P80 to P90.
Samahang Industriya ng Agrikultura (Sinag) chairman Rosendo So said that if Piñol talked to the industry first, the nationwide ban would not have been necessary.
So explained that the bird flu outbreaks in Pampanga and Nueva Ecija were isolated cases that have been overblown.
Data from the Philippine Statistics Authority coupled with the value of the broiler and layer sectors show that the industry was losing about P179 million a day, according to Sinag.
Inciong estimated that the industry may lose P1 billion a month if the ban on the movement of poultry products will not be lifted.
“We only decided to ban shipments because we were actually in the dark at that time. The bird flu outbreak in San Luis, Pampanga, was reported very late, since there have been indications as early as April. We needed to contain the virus in Luzon. But now that manifestation were pinpointed, we can safely say that we have contained the virus,” Piñol said in defense.
Nonetheless, Inciong said that this is a welcome development for the industry, and that they are hoping demand for chicken will pick up momentum with the issuance of the new memorandum circular.
He added that it may take two weeks for the industry to recover in terms of the improvement in farm-gate and retail prices, but much longer in terms of profit.
Signboards
DA is also considering putting up signboards in chicken stalls in markets with the help of NMIS to allay fears of consumers who are still opting not to buy poultry products due to the recent outbreak.
Head of the Bureau of Animal Industry’s (BAI) Animal Disease Control Section Dr. Arlene Vytiaco reported that the town of San Luis in Pampanga has completed its depopulation of birds within the one kilometer quarantine zone, while culling operations in Nueva Ecija were expected to be completed by Friday.
Piñol, meanwhile, said that compensation for affected farmers are set to be released once all necessary documentations have been submitted.
Until now, the agency still don’t know what caused the avian influenza outbreak that started in San Luis. Dr. Vytiaco said they are looking at migratory birds in the Candaba Swamp as the most probable source.
BAI is still waiting for the results of the confirmatory tests from the Australian Animal Health Laboratory (AAHL) to know whether the virus possesses the N component, which will make the virus highly pathogenic and transmissible to humans.
Asked what’s taking the results too long, Vytiaco said samples sent in AAHL were inadequate, which would require the propagation of the samples first. Results are expected to be released in three to four days.
Keeping Cebu safe
Lopez-Vito, on the other hand, said their primary concern is to ensure that the poultry industry of Bantayan Island will be free from bird flu considering that the island is a major producer of poultry in Cebu and the region.
She said the office of Gov. Hilario Davide III and the mayors of the three towns on Bantayan Island have been assisting the DA in providing manpower to monitor poultry farms on the island.
For her part, Cebu City Veterinarian Dr. Alice Utlang yesterday assured that all poultry farms in the city have been cleared from bird flu.
Utlang also said that the migratory birds now homing at the swampy areas along the South Road Properties (SRP) have been cleared of avian flu based on the laboratory test results of samples collected from the birds’ droppings.
Lopez-Vito said the bird flu is not air-borne rather it is contacted through physical contact among the fowls in a flock.
She urged the public to be vigilant and report to authorities if they notice unusual deaths among their fowls.
She said that although it is normal that there are mortalities in poultry breeding, a large number of fowls dying within a short period of time could be an indicator that avian flu is affecting the poultry population.
“Cebu and Central Visayas is free from the bird flu virus. The challenge now is to keep this status,” Lopez-Vito added.