Philippines Confiscate Danish Poultry Shipments

Agriculture
Secretary Arthur Yap has directed the Department of Agriculture (DA) quarantine
officers and inspectors at all major airports and sea ports in the country to
stop and confiscate all incoming shipment of live birds, poultry and poultry
products from Denmark.
    The DA
press report disclosed that Secretary Yap issued the ban after the Office
International des Epizooties (OIE) or the Animal Health Organization confirmed
that low pathogenic Avian Influenza or bird flu has been directed in a poultry
farm in Stenstrup, Svendborg Kommune, Southin Denmark which affected geese,
chickens, ducks and mallards.
    The Philippines also banned imports of birds and
poultry and its products from countries, among others, Korea, Saudi
Arabia, Poland
and the Western African Country of Benin, to protect human health and the
poultry industry in the Philippines.     The
Agriculture Secretary also directed BAI Director Davino Catbagan to intensify
the implementation of the preventive measures in airports and seaports in the
cities of Davao and General Santos owing to
their proximity to Indonesia,
one of Asia‘s bird-flu infected countries.
    The Philippines, Bruenei and Singapore are the only three Avian
Influenza-free countries in Asia, the DA press
report disclosed.