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Avian flu affects individual growers, trade
The impact of avian flu outbreaks is felt by the affected growers, but a market analyst says, so far, the number is relatively low.
“At this point, poultry production is not being affected,” said Will Sawyer, an animal protein analyst for Rabobank, “trade, unfortunately will be, and it’s something that will last at least until the summer.”
Avian influenza has occurred in the Pacific Northwest, but more recently has broken at one or two locations each in Minnesota, Missouri and Arkansas.
“The impact is really a trade impact, as a number of countries have banned those individual state from exporting all poultry products, whether it’s meat or eggs, into their markets,” said Sawyer.
The fear, said Sawyer, is that the H5N2 high pathogenic avian flu strain will continue to spread through the southeastern U.S., where a lot of the country’s poultry is raised.
The strain is highly contagious to poultry, but the risk to humans from infected birds is low. There are no reports of humans infected with the virus.
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