Brazil has at last applied to South Africa for a compartmentalisation agreement that would allow poultry imports from areas not affected by bird flu.
At the moment, all poultry imports from Brazil are banned after one bird flu outbreak in the south of the country. The ban applies to all producers because of the lack of an agreement limiting the ban to small areas, such as a province, city or production facility.
The South African government has been under pressure from chicken importers, whose supplies of substantial quantities of Brazilian offal and mechanically deboned meat will soon come to a halt once all consignments shipped before the ban have landed.
Importers agitated for a compartmentalisation agreement last year, anticipating that bird flu would eventually reach Brazil. But when the disease struck Brazil last month, Brazil had still not applied for a compartmentalisation agreement similar to those it has with other countries.
That has now happened, according to Izaak Breitenbach of the SA Poultry Association (SAPA). He said negotiations between the two countries will determine whether poultry imports will be allowed from areas in Brazil that are free of bird flu, and on what basis.
