Tehran, Iran, Aug 10
By Mehdi Sepahvand - Trend:
Two months after Iran imposed a ban on poultry imports from Iran following reports of an outbreak of the highly pathogenic H5N1 bird flu virus in some farms in the country, Baghdad lifted the ban on August 10.
Iraq banned poultry and egg imports from Iran on June 18, after the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) published a report on the H5N1 bird flu virus in Iran.
Iran claimed that the virus has not spread around the country and the infected farms are limited to Iran's northern Mazandaran province, saying that Iran's Veterinary Organization is currently negotiating with Iraqi officials to ensure them that Iran's exported eggs and chickens are not from the infected region and are safe.
It should be noted that the H5N1 virus was also detected in a number of poultry farms in Sulaymaniyah, a province in northern Iraq along the Iranian border in mid-May, which was the first time that Iraq has reported H5N1 since the summer of 2006.
Iraq also imposed a temporary ban on imports of Turkish chicken amid the bird flu scare in May.
Today, the Trade Promotion Organization of Iran released a report saying that Iraq informed Iran that the ban on poultry and egg imports from Iran has been eliminated.
Iran produces 2 million tons of poultry and 900,000 tons of egg annually.
Iran exported about 13,000 tons of poultry and 22,000 tons of egg in the first three months of current fiscal year, started on March 21.
Edited by CN