Egg Exports Slowly Resume as Bird Flu Contained

EghtesadOnline: About 1,500 tons of eggs have been exported to Afghanistan since April 2, the secretary-general of Iran’s Association of Producers of Egg-Laying Hen said.

News ID: ۷۷۷۱۸۲

23 June 2017

“Iraq too lifted the ban on egg imports from Iran 10 days ago, yet the high price of Iranian eggs compared with those of its rivals is an impediment to growth in exports,” Farzad Talakesh was also quoted as saying by Mehr News Agency.

The official noted that last week an egg shipment weighing around 20 tons was exported to Qatar.  Due to an outbreak of the highly contagious H5N8 bird flu virus in Iranian farms, exports of eggs and chicken had come to a halt as of last November.

Consequently, Iraq and Afghanistan banned the imports of Iranian eggs and chicken early December, Financial Tribune reported.

Talakesh had previously said that Iran’s egg exports could not exceed 50,000 tons in the current Iranian year that started on March 21, as the country lost a huge number of chickens due to the outbreak and its export markets.

H5N8 was first detected in Iran in late November 2016.

“In March 2017, it was reported that the avian influenza had spread across 24 Iranian provinces leading to the culling of some 12 million chicken,” Nasser Nabipour, the head of the board of directors at Tehran’s Union of Producers of Egg-Laying Chicken, said.

The H5N8 strain of bird flu is deadly for poultry, but according to World Health Organization, although human infection with the virus cannot be excluded, the likelihood is low. After months of tough struggle, Nabipour said on May 6 that Iran Veterinary Organization has informed the World Organization for Animal Health that the country has rid itself of this virus.

Iran exported 40,000 tons of eggs last year, some 55,000 tons less compared to the previous year.