Poultry industry needs urgent intervention

Urgent intervention is
needed to contain the
avian inf luenza (H5N8)
outbreak as the survival
of the poultry industry
in South Africa hangs in
the balance, according
to the director of the
South African Poultry
Association’s (Sapa) Poultry
Disease Management
Agency, Dr
Ziyanda
Majokweni.
She told
FTW that an
inability to prevent any
further outbreaks could
deplete bird numbers
even more, thus making
it impossible for local
producers to satisfy
domestic demand, let alone
focus on exports.
“If the industry is unable
to satisfy the local market
as a result of the outbreak,
imports may well increase
if the demand for the
products remains. Poultry
imports compete
with locally
produced
product and thus this
would have a negative
impact on the local
industry leading to
job losses – and most
importantly loss of internal
production capacity,”
Majokweni pointed out.
Since late June this
year there have been a
total of 16 outbreaks in
Mpumalanga, Gauteng
and most recently the
Western Cape. Eight of
these were on commercial
chicken farms and two on
commercial ostrich farms.
As part of the
intervention measures,
Sapa has requested
monetary compensation
for affected farms from the
Department of Agriculture,
Forestry and Fisheries
(Daff). It is also waiting to
hear if permission will be
granted to import fertile
eggs to “close the gap” in
the number of birds that
have had to be culled.
Daff spokesperson
Bomikazi Molapo told
FTW that around
720 000 birds had
been culled so
far which was
a major loss
in production
capacity for the
industry.
She noted in
a statement that
the department
would soon
provide guidelines
on compensation
going forward
and would consider
the industry’s request to
import fertile eggs as it
needed to take protection
of the national poultry
population into account.
Majokweni said
Sapa would only have
statistics on the extent of
disruptions on poultry and
poultry product exports,
as well as the economic
impact of the outbreaks,
this month (September).