Poultry farmers call on gov’t to lift ban on chicken sale

Last week, Cameroonian poultry farmers demonstrated in front of the offices of the Prime Minister in Yaoundé, the capital, and in the city of Bafoussam, a main chicken production area in the Western region.

They demand the lifting of the ban on the chicken sale, a decision taken a little over a month ago, following the discovery of bird flu outbreaks in the country.

In front of the Prime Minister’s offices, these poultry farmers who were waving picket signs reminding at the same time the importance of the poultry sector in the Cameroonian economy and the losses inflected to the sector by the government ban; symbolically ate eggs, while shouting: “there is no more bird flu”.

As a reminder, since the discovery, at end May 2016, of a bird flu outbreak in the farm of the Mvog-Betsi Poultry Complex in Yaoundé, the national poultry sector has already lost approximately FCfa 10 billion, according to François Djonou, President of the Poultry Association of Cameroon (Ipavic).

Since the start of the epizooty, which finally affected four regions in the country within a month, local poultry farmers feared that the government would end up authorising imports of frozen chicken banned since 2005. “There is enough chicken in the country.

Apart from the bird flu outbreaks, the local market is fairly well supplied.

There will therefore be no imports. Especially since the health problem is moving towards a positive resolution”, Dr Taïga, Minister of Livestock, had finally assured.