Hungary poultry imports halted due to detected virus

TIRANA, feb.7 – The Ministry of Food and Agriculture of Albania announced a general ban on all imports of poultry from some regions of Hungary following reports that avian flu had been discovered in the country. A ministry official stated last week that the measure is quite usual in such cases and aims to save Albania from H5N1 bird flu. Some importers have not refrained from complaints about unfair competition. They say the issuance of Ministry health alerts have been influenced by local producers of eggs and poultry. Hungarian poultry industry producers compete in the Albanian market benefiting from the economy of scales. Increasing local production has resulted in lower imports. Thus decreasing figures have been noted since 2001. Albania has imported EUR 318, 000 of poultry from Hungary till September 2006. 2005 statistics for the eggs and poultry production industry showed the business had grown to US$70 million annually.