The Department of Agriculture (DA) ordered a temporary import ban on domestic and wild birds and their products, including poultry meat, day-old chicks, eggs and semen from Ukraine.
The DA said it imposed the ban as a precautionary measure to protect the local poultry industry against avian influenza after Ukraine confirmed outbreaks of the disease in its poultry farms recently.
“There is a need to prevent the entry of HPAI [highly pathogenic avian influenza] virus to protect the health of the local poultry population,” the orders read.
The government has earlier banned domestic and wild birds and their products from Slovakia and Hungary. The import ban on poultry products from these European nations was contained in Memorandum Orders 8, 9, and 10.
The Philippines was free from bird flu until 2017, when the government detected the presence of the virus in poultry farms in Central Luzon. The Philippines was one of the few countries in Southeast Asia that was not hit by the virus which wreaked havoc on the poultry sector of the region in 2003.
‘Minimal risk’
The DA has also lifted the import ban on hog, pork and pork-related products from Czech Republic after the European country has been declared free from the fatal African swine fever (ASF).
The DA issued Memorandum Order (MO) 7 Series of 2020 which authorized the lifting of the temporary ban on the importation of domestic wild pigs, and their products including pork meat and semen from Czech Republic.
“Based on the evaluation of the Bureau of Animal Industry (BAI), the risk of contamination from importing domestic and wild pigs and their products from Czech Republic is negligible,” read the order, which was dated January 28.
The MO noted that based on Czech Republic’s self-declaration report of its recovery from ASF to the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE), ASF events affecting wild boars within its borders are now “closed and resolved.”
“All import transaction of the above commodities shall be in accordance with existing rules and regulations of the Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Animal Industry and National Meat Inspection Service,” the MO read.