PARIS: France reported a severe case of bird flu on Friday on a duck farm in the southwest, another setback for French poultry and foie gras exports which were hit by a similar outbreak a year ago.
The H5N8 avian influenza virus was confirmed at a farm in the Tarn region, the agriculture ministry said, days after the virus was detected among wild birds in northern France and following outbreaks in Europe linked to migrating birds. The H5N8 virus has never been detected in humans, unlike some other strains, but it led to the culling of millions of farm birds in Asia in 2014 before spreading to Europe.
The new case means France, the European Union’s biggest poultry breeder, will not be able to regain for now its international status as being free of the highly pathogenic flu.
It had aimed to recover that status on Dec. 3 had no further cases been found, the ministry said in a statement.
Now it won’t be cleared for at least another 90 days, delaying a return to normal trade with countries such as Japan that imposed blanket bans on French poultry products during the previous wave of outbreaks.
“The immediate consequence is regarding the bird flu-free status,” Marie-Pierre Pe, spokeswoman for foie gras makers’ group CIFOG, said. “This outbreak puts back by four months the possible reopening of trade barriers.”
Producers estimate that a four-month halt to duck and geese breeding earlier this year to stamp out the previous wave of bird flu will reduce foie gras output by a quarter this year and raise prices by about 10 percent, just as demand rises towards its peak in the year-end festive season.
Some countries have limited trade restrictions to areas of France where bird flu has been detected and the agriculture ministry said this practice should allow France to continue exporting after the new outbreak.
In the new case, the H5N8 virus killed 2,000 out of a flock of 5,000 ducks on the affected farm and the remaining birds are to be culled as part of preventative measures, the ministry said.
France had already introduced increased surveillance after bird flu spread in several European countries in recent weeks, and CIFOG’s Pe said the sector was much better prepared to tackle the disease after this year’s crisis.
