The avian influenza outbreak in the United States is a cause for concern among chicken farmers north of the border.
“In our trade agreements across Canada, we have to leave room for 20 per cent of our hatching eggs to come into the country. So, when those flocks get wiped out due to A.I. in the U.S., it’s now affecting how many we can grow here for the next month or so,” said Amy VanderHeide, chair of Chicken Farmers of Nova Scotia.
VanderHeide says local farmers are seeing their orders for chicks cancelled, leaving them unsure about the upcoming season.
“I know that some feed stores were told that they wouldn’t get chicks, but we are working really closely with the Hatching Egg Association in Nova Scotia to try to find as many hatching eggs as we can, and if the hatchery can get them, they will hatch them,” she says.
“We’ve also been hit with avian influenza in areas across the country that has also taken out breeder flocks, so we’re also rebuilding ours at the same time. We do have several small backyard outbreaks here in Nova Scotia so we’re watching closely.”
Sylvain Charlebois, the head of Dalhousie University’s Agri-Foods Lab, says with spring comes more birds migrating into Canada – some of which will have viruses.
“So, that’s why a lot of people in the industry are holding their breath right now,” says Charlebois.
Charlebois says bio-security practices in Canada are more stringent than in the U.S. and that farmers assess and manage risks to their birds differently than their counterparts in the U.S. He says geography is another advantage.
“Our barns are pretty far apart. There’s enough distance where in the U.S., they really lost control because a lot of barns are close to each other and so the virus really spread very quickly, like wildfire,” Charlebois says.
VanderHeide says Canada does not send any birds to the U.S. as part of the trade deal between the two countries.
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