Bangladesh News

The culling of some 1.65 lakh chickens at a poultry farm at Badda in the capital began yesterday after the detection of deadly avian influenza virus, which the officials say is the biggest ever culling in the country so far.

Meanwhile, reports from bird flu control room and our correspondents said 13,780 chickens and other fowls were culled in Narsingdi, Shariatpur, Narayanganj and Jhenidah over the last two days.

The staffs at Omega Poultry Farm Limited at Beraid in Badda first suspected bird flu infection on February 10 when 20 chickens at the farm died suddenly.

“It alarmed us all because, usually, no more than one or two chickens die a day. And the number of deaths doubled a couple of days later,” Alif Ahmed Khan, chairman of the farm, told The Daily Star.

Suspending egg collection and chicken sale, staffs of the farm sent samples to livestock office for test last Wednesday.

The test at Bangladesh Livestock Research Institute the next day found the presence of deadly H5N1 virus of bird flu and the government Friday night issued orders for culling all the poultry of the farm.

Set up on 9-acre land, the farm is run with machines “without any human involvement”, Omega chairman Alif said.

Livestock officials started culling fowls at the farm yesterday evening after digging a 45×25×8 cubic feet pit on the farmland for dumping the fowls.

“We can say the whole culling would take three days,” Dhaka District Livestock Officer (DLO) Shaikh Saidur Rahman told The Daily Star from the spot, adding that 200 employees are working.

Since the infection is of grave nature, all the fowls in five sheds have to be culled and the eggs destroyed, he said.

Alif Ahmed put the number of eggs at over 4 lakh as he said that they did not collect eggs over the last three days.

After finishing the culling at the farm, the officials will start culling fowls at households within 1 kilometre area of the farm.

Asked, DLO Saidur Rahman confirmed that it is going to be the biggest culling in the country so far. In Dhaka, the previous highest number of fowls culled was 8,500 in Savar, he added.

Bird flu virus has never been detected in the farm since its inception in 2004.

Asked to estimate the loss caused due to the infection and subsequent culling, the Omega chairman failed to give any specific figure. “You see, we had to spend Tk 35 crore on this project. We have a bank loan of Tk 15 crore.”

Saying that it will be impossible for them to restart the business without compensation, he said, “Firstly, I would request for an interest waiver till we can resume business.”

It would take about two years to resume business in full swing, he added.

Our Jhenidah correspondent said livestock officials on Friday culled 938 fowls including native ducks, hens and pigeons and destroyed 522 eggs in Moheshpur upazila.

Of them, 854 fowls and 400 eggs were destroyed at the farm of Joarder Rahim while the rest at the households within 1 kilometre of his farm.

Officials at the bird flu control room said 58 fowls of Mamunur Rashid in Shibpur upazila of Narsingdi were culled on Friday after 2,442 fowls died of bird flu there.

Another 1,100 fowls died at Ma Poultry Farm in Raipur upazila.

According to the control room, livestock officials culled 67 fowls of Sobhan Bepari and 720 others chickens, ducks and pigeons of his seven neighbours in Nadra village of Damurhuda in Shariatpur on Friday.

Meantime, 8,512 fowls were culled the same day at Jasim Poultry Farm in Gazipur Sadar.