In September, thirty thousand chickens were slaughtered after laboratory tests confirming that avian influenza had been detected.
But, as we told you last night - those were false positives; follow-up testing from the US confirmed that there was no avian influenza in Belize. So, that meant that the owners of the affected farms lost a hundred thousand dollars in chicken stocks due to the scare of a disease that wasn't in Belize.
So, how will the Ministry of Agriculture and the farmers resolve those costly consequences? Well, that's what our news team asked Minister Jose Mai today when we met him at another event. Here's what he had to say about the difficult conversation Government will have to have with the poultry sector on this issue:
Jose Mai, Minister of Agriculture
"We are guided by science. When we sent those samples to Georgia they came back positive. 2 tests were done and they came back positive. Subsequent to that afterwards more tests were done from another lab and it says that it was a false positive. But we cannot wait on a confirmation of a lab one month down the road to act. If this is a disease that is threatening the entire poultry industry, then we have to act and so BAHA as the frontline of animal health and plant health had to make the very tough decisions. The important thing though that the disease is no more. The serologist test shows now that the animals may have been infected, because the anti-bodies tests were positive. Now, a decision was made in partnership with the poultry association, the poultry producers, it was not a decision made alone by BAHA. They agree to this is the way to go if we are to protect the industry. The important thing is that we dont have the disease and if there would have been any risk, its not there. But we cannot wait for confirmation 1 month afterwards to say that we will act on the birds."
"We could have acted following the OIE standards could have acted even more stiffer, but we had to manage the situation and ensure that we are doing this in the best interest of the farmers in the industry."
Reporter
"The idea; look the farmers should get compensation for the destruction. What are your thoughts on that?"
Jose Mai, Minister of Agriculture
"I met with members of the association and that is not what I get from them, the farmers themselves. If it is the position of one or two people, I do not know, but dialogue has to continue and we have to sit down and decide how we are going to move forward with this. I don't know that he said he wants to sue or that he wants compensation. I don't know, but that is something we can discuss in the very near future. The important thing is that we do not have the disease and even if there would have been the measures we put in place, would avoided the entire destruction of the national flock."
Later in the news, you'll hear what Mai had to say about the ongoing impasse in the sugar industry before the start of the next crop season, which is about a month away.
