Poultry farmers urged to take precautions against avian flu virus

AMMAN — Poultry farmers are urged to keep their birds indoors and ensure that enclosures are well-fenced to keep away wild birds that could be carrying avian influenza, the Ministry of Agriculture said on Monday.

The country last week suspended its imports of pet birds, frozen poultry and unprocessed poultry meat from India Israel and several European countries, where a severe strain of the disease spread. It has now tightened inspection on poultry farms across the country.

“The Kingdom is free from the virus, but we are intensifying our inspection and reminding poultry farmers of the precautions they need to undertake to keep the virus from spreading,” the ministry’s spokesperson, Nimer Haddadin, told The Jordan Times.

The ban on poultry imports includes Denmark, Germany, Hungary, Israel, India, the Netherlands, Poland and Sweden.

“… And since the disease has also appeared in Israel, it is imperative to increase safety and precautionary measures,” Haddadin noted.

In Israel, an outbreak of the severe strain of the virus was been reported early last week on a farm, according to the World Organisation for Animal Health, which said on its website that the virus strain has probably arrived from Europe with migrating birds.

Jordanian Poultry Producers Union President Abdul Shakour Jamjoum said that while taking safety and precautionary measures to prevent an outbreak of bird flu is important, “there is no 100 per cent way to keep bird flu away from poultry farms”.

“Two factors can make poultry farms at risk of infection — the weather and the location,” Jamjoum told The Jordan Times.

He pointed out that the virus becomes active in wet climate, noting that the current warm, dry and sunny weather in the Kingdom is helpful.

“In addition, poultry farms in Jordan are not located in areas where migrant birds gather, such as Aqaba, Azraq and the Jordan Valley,” Jamjoum said.

There are 2,689 poultry farms in Jordan. A total of 85.4 per cent are for the production of broiler chickens, 10.4 per cent for egg-laying hens and 4.2 per cent for breeder chickens, according to the ministry.

Official figures also indicate that the Kingdom has 80.5 million birds in 4,972 complexes spread over 2.7 million square metres across the country.

Jamjoum said that poultry farms in Jordan are mainly located in Irbid, Ramtha in Mafraq, Tafileh, Karak and Madaba.