France resumes foie gras exports to Japan
According to the French authorities, no new outbreaks of HPAi have been detected in the country for more than three months and all of the identified H5N8 outbreaks between the end of 2016 and June 2017 have been cleared.
The French minister of Agriculture, Stéphane Travert, said that the status will allow France to obtain the reopening of the export markets to third countries for poultry and poultry products.
"We know that the foie gras sector is going through difficulties as a result of this bird flu and I think this is good news, both for the image of our country, for French gastronomy and for the foie gras producers," Stéphane Travert said on Radio Classique, according to Web-agri .
The Minister also announced that the compensation scheme for the operating losses that resulted from the HPAI outbreaks reaches the sum of 20 million euros.
"A similar mechanism is currently being discussed with the European Commission for the crisis experienced during the winter of 2016-2017 (H5N8)," the Ministry of Agriculture said in a statement.
The producers of foie gras announced this week that in 2017, following two outbreaks of HPAI, production will fall to only 23 million ducks, "a decrease of 20% compared to 2016 (29 million), and a fall of 40% compared to 2015 (nearly 38 million). In total, some 4.5 million ducks were slaughtered last year during a major operation to curb the spread of the virus."
Furthermore, the authorities will launch a campaign between 30 October and 3 December 2017 to remind all stakeholders of their obligation to respect the measures of preventing the contamination of farms in the future so that France can remain HPAI-free.
The measures can be accessed on the site of the French Ministry of Agriculture.
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