Since 2022, the U.S. poultry industry has been battling a particularly persistent strain of H5N1, or avian influenza, and more than 100 million birds have been affected over the last two and a half years. Bernt Nelson, an economist with the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF), says turkeys and egg layers have been hit the hardest.
“Broiler flocks tend to benefit from being tucked away a little bit from the Central and Pacific flyways. We’ve had 73 million egg layers affected by this overall, and this has resulted in some volatility in egg prices. If we look at turkeys, we’ve had over 14 million turkeys affected by the virus. So, production for turkeys is down about six percent from last year.”
Nelson says the response to avian influenza from USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service has been effective.
“First off, on the poultry side of things, we had regionalization. We still see the spread of the virus, but overall, the biosecurity efforts that they put in place have kept the poultry industry functioning. If we switch gears and take a look at the response in dairy, they used the Emergency Assistance for Livestock, Honeybees, and Farm-Raised Fish program, that’s ELAP, as a medium to deliver indemnities to dairy farmers. So far, this program has made over 100 payments totaling $18 million to help offset these losses.”
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