Russia has temporarily banned imports of poultry meat and poultry products treated at lower temperatures than 70 degrees Celsius, citing recent reports of bird flu in Hungary.
Russia’s ban will impact a few thousand tonnes of mostly duck and goose products, Attila Csorbai, head of the Hungarian poultry product council, told national wire service MTI.
Hungary’s farm ministry has not yet been officially notified about the Russian move, officials said.
The Hungarian food health authority identified the bird flu virus in samples from Füzesgyarmat, a farm in south-eastern Hungary in late February. The virus has not yet been communicated to humans, according to the authority
The farm’s entire stock, over 100,000 ducks, were slaughtered at the poultry in Füzesgyarmat. Hungary’s chief veterinarian, Lajos Bognár, said on Monday that a thirty-day ban on poultry shipments from the region remains in force. Also, a 3 km-deep protected area and a 10 sq km area of observation have been set up around the farm.
There is no evidence that the avian flu type found in Hungary, H5N8, could infect humans, and no other cases of avian flu infection were found in the region, Lajos Bognár said.
Russia was not the only country to react. According to the Hungarian national bureau for food chain safety, Japan, Singapore and South Korea have also halted imports of poultry and eggs from Hungary.
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