State urges end of poultry restrictions
By Min Sheng (China Daily)
Updated: 2005-12-19 05:23

All unreasonable obstacles and restrictions against normal marketing of poultry products should be removed immediately to protect the healthy development of the industry, Xinhua News Agency reported yesterday.

Recently, some local governments have wantonly expanded the range of epidemic-stricken areas and forbidden healthy poultry products to be sold or even pass though, said a statement released yesterday by the leading office against bird flu under the State Council.

One reason for the local government to do this is that they want to protect the development of their local poultry and reject competition from outside regions, said the statement.

All unreasonable regulations and restrictions made by local governments should be cancelled immediately, the statement said.

There has only been one new outbreak in the past 20 days, in Jiangxi Province December 15, and more than 23 epidemic areas have been announced as being free of the disease. However, experts warned that the epidemic might break out in some other places.

With the New Year and Spring Festival holidays coming soon, the consumption of poultry will increase markedly, which means quarantine and health authorities have to make more efforts to supervise the quality of poultry products in the market.

However, the epidemic and the supervision should not be regarded as an excuse for some local governments to block the free marketing of healthy poultry products between different regions, Xinhua reported.

(China Daily 12/19/2005 page2)