AGRICULTURE

Policy agenda interrupted

Walailak Keeratipipatpong

Food safety has been promoted to strengthen the sector.

THE GOVERNMENT'S strategy for increasing the international competitiveness of the agricultural sector is composed mainly of measures to encourage value-added production.

Promoting higher-margin organic farm produce and raising agricultural food safety standards, however, has also been undertaken to address the growing restrictions imposed by importers in foreign markets as demand for clean and chemical-free food grows.

However, implementation of food safety measures was not taken seriously by the administration until 2002, when the country's key food exports, chicken and shrimp, were rejected by buyers in the European Union and the United States after the presence of nitrofurans and chloramphenicol _ banned chemical substances _ was detected in some consignments.

Since then, the campaign for hygienic food production was placed at the forefront of the government's agenda, complete with a campaign marking 2004 as "Food Safety Year".

Deputy Agriculture Minister Newin Chidchob made headlines when he vowed to take revenge by testing food imports from the EU and US to see if they contained any banned chemicals.

Late last year, he ordered some 500,000 farms to register and improve their operations to meet the government's Good Agricultural Practices standards by mid 2004.

But the deadline was shelved at the end of 2003 due to the bird flu outbreak, with officials citing fears that efforts to recover from the fallout of the epidemic would eclipse the food safety campaign.

At any rate, the government had its hands full restoring local consumer confidence in the safety of eating chicken. A number of chicken eat-ins were organised featuring members of the cabinet, led by Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, chowing down on fried chicken in public. The tactics worked, albeit slowly. Weeks later, public consumption of chicken returned to normal.

The virus hit three million poultry farming families hard and led to a mass cull of over 35 million birds. Apart from the immediate losses, the virus is expected to continue to hinder expansion of food exports. Shipments of poultry were reportedly halved in the first four months of this year and the industry's full recovery is estimated by some observers to still be a long way off.

The National Economic Social Development Board said in early June that the bird flu outbreak had knocked off about 0.5%, or equal to about seven billion baht from the country's gross domestic product, which was worth 15 trillion baht for the quarter.

Uncertainty still dogs the sector's recovery. As if to illustrate this fact, fresh outbreaks came just two weeks after the Agriculture Ministry announced that the country was free of bird flu on May 14. Reports that the virus had reappeared in some spots in the north, threw water on plans to resume raw meat exports.

The fresh outbreak also led to the cancellation of a much anticipated visit by the world organisation for animal health or OIE (Office International des Epizooties) to verify that Thailand was free of the virus.

"Once Thai farms are given the all-clear by the OIE, exports will resume within the next six months," said Yukol Limlaemthong, the director-general of the Livestock Development Department. He predicted fresh meat exports would resume some time in the fourth quarter of this year. However, some analysts have expressed their doubts due to delays in clearing the virus from Thai farms and a lack of positive signals from the OIE.

"Although we could contain the outbreak, there is no assurance that the deadly virus will not be detected on Thai poultry farms in the future," one expert noted.

Udom Photi, an adviser to the Broiler Breeders Association, said a number of local veterinarians and technicians have been researching the causes of the outbreak, which hit poultry farms in 10 nations in Asia, with China, Vietnam and Thailand the hardest hit.

The state-funded research is aimed at devising preventative measures for use against the flu and other epidemics.

With no magic bullet likely to be discovered anytime in the near future, farmers have been advised to build up their own immunity, with a string of new bio-security measures recommended.

Totally closed-system farming as applied by poultry farming giants has not been required, but new regulations emphasise the need for better hygiene in farm areas, animal feed and washing down vehicles used to transport animals.

Mr Udom added that small farmers will not be forced to invest in expensive measures, such as evaporative cooling systems.

The outbreak, which has led to calls for increased modernisation in Thai agriculture, could be seen as an important wake-up call for the country to pay more attention to how it produces food for local consumption and export.

Critics say the crisis showed that food safety should not be just a one-off public health campaign, but should instead be run on a continuous basis if the government is serious about its "Kitchen of the World" plans.

The issue of trust was also brought to the forefront, showing all the investments in food safety can be rendered worthless overnight if the public's faith in the authorities is shaken.

Many point to the alleged bird flu cover-up as the Thaksin administration's first big crisis of confidence, with a lingering effect that may never totally disappear.