The recent ban on the importation of poultry and poultry byproducts will not affect local market prices and supply, according to Agriculture Minister Zulfikar Mustapha who has assured that there is enough produce in-country to meet the demand.
“We have enough chicken in the country. The supplies are there from our local farmers,” Mustapha expressed during an interview with this publication.
“That doesn’t that mean [because] we stop the importation of chicken; the prices of chicken will increase. We have enough chicken. The Guyana Poultry Producers Association told me, I had a meeting with them, and they told me that they have enough supplies…that the market has been saturated and there is enough local chicken. So, there is no need to import any chicken,” he added.
The ban on poultry and its byproducts was last week instituted by the Guyana Livestock Development Authority (GLDA). The ban was in light of national security concerns regarding the spread of the bird flu disease globally, and particularly in the Americas.
Bird flu is a disease that can spread through entire flocks of domestic birds within days, through birds’ droppings and saliva, or through contaminated feed and water.
According to GLDA’s Chief Executive Officer Dr. Dwight Walrond, the organisation has been consistently researching and monitoring this situation internationally and regionally through their epidemiological department.
The GLDA, therefore, is seeking to do a full evaluation of this situation across the region–in the Caribbean, South, Central and North Americas–before importation can continue, he explained.
As this is a regional concern, there is no set limit to this halt of importation. “This is not a case where Guyana alone is fighting against what is happening. It is a concerted effort by all these countries [within this region] to combat these diseases.”
The GLDA CEO also revealed that later this month, he will be participating in a meeting with the World Organisation of Animal Health (WOAH) to determine best strategies to contain and try to eradicate diseases that affect animals for consumption.
“Locally, what we’ve been doing is reinforcing all of our ports of entry and improving our testing capabilities in our laboratory,” Walrond said. “We’re taking samples on a daily basis, we’ve completed postal surveys looking for those diseases so should we encounter anything, we can move to contain it quickly.”
