China has ordered all poultry imports and relative products
shipped from Canada after September 23 be returned or destroyed to
ward off the H7N3 avian influenza virus.
The decision jointly made by the Ministry of Agriculture and the
General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and
Quarantine came two days after the World Organization for Animal
Health (OIE) released an outbreak alert, saying that the highly
pathogenic virus has been confirmed in a chicken broiler breeder
flock in Saskatchewan.
The Paris-based international organization warned that
approximately 540 roosters have died in one barn containing
approximately 600 birds. Another 49,100 roosters and broiler
breeders held in other nine barns nearby are susceptible.
To remedy the situation, China has imposed an import ban on all
poultry and relative products from Canada and required relevant
local governmental departments to seal up all Canadian poultry and
relative products carried by airplanes, ships or trains from abroad
that must stop over in or transit China.
Illegal poultry imports from Canada must be destroyed under the
supervision of entry-exit inspection and quarantine
departments.
China has decided to restore as of Sunday the imports of animals
with cloven hooves and relative products from Santa Catarina, Acre
and the cities of Rio Grande do Sul and Rondonia of Amazon in
Brazil as these regions have been confirmed by the OIE as free from
the foot-and-mouth disease.
(Xinhua News Agency October 1, 2007)