Reading Time: 2 minutes Brussels | Reuters –– The European Union is to resume exports of beef to Canada from 19 of its member countries for the first time since 1996, when they were halted in the wake of the BSE scandal. The European Commission said Tuesday that Canada’s action was part of a growing trend to recognize the […] Read more
EU to resume beef exports to Canada
Canada now avian flu-free
Reading Time: 2 minutes With no new cases in poultry since April and no farms in quarantine since July, Canada has officially declared itself free of avian influenza. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency said Thursday it has informed the World Organization of Animal Health (OIE) that Ontario is free of notifiable avian flu. No new outbreaks of highly pathogenic […] Read more
Avian flu controls lifted in 10 U.S. states
Reading Time: 2 minutes U.S. animal health officials have closed the books for now on avian influenza infections in 10 states, with five others remaining. In its latest report to the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) last week, the U.S. federal Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) said all control areas for avian flu have been released […] Read more
Last of Ontario’s avian flu quarantines ends
Reading Time: 2 minutes Movement of birds and bird products in, through and out of southwestern Ontario’s Oxford and Waterloo counties is no longer subject to federal quarantine. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency announced Wednesday it has removed its second and final avian influenza control zone, which has been in place since April 21 and covered portions of both […] Read more
BSE case’s traceout continues
Reading Time: 2 minutes Federal officials tracing out the herdmates of Canada’s 19th domestic case of BSE expect to have their final report on the case ready in late fall. Confirmed Feb. 11 as Canada’s first domestic case of the brain-wasting bovine disease since 2011, Case 19 was born in 2009 on the same northern Alberta farm as Case […] Read more
SW Ontario pullet flock’s ILT contained
Reading Time: 2 minutes A warning to southwestern Ontario’s poultry producers in May to step up biosecurity over a non-avian-flu-related disease outbreak has been lifted. The Feather Board Command Centre, the emergency response office for Ontario’s poultry and egg sector boards, last week issued a “stand down” for heightened biosecurity, following an outbreak of avian infectious laryngotracheitis (ILT) in […] Read more
Canada to check India’s feed corn for aflatoxin
Reading Time: < 1 minute All feed corn coming to Canada from India is now going to be held and tested for aflatoxin, as high levels of the toxins have recently turned up in organic corn from the country. Importers of corn — organic or otherwise — from India, starting immediately, first must sample the corn, upon arrival in Canada […] Read more
Potato ‘fields’ clarified for cross-border trade
Reading Time: 2 minutes Canadian and U.S. food inspectors have agreed on what they mean by a “field” in any restrictions they place on potato trade on account of potato cyst nematodes. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) and U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) on Tuesday announced new revisions to their Guidelines on Surveillance and Phytosanitary […] Read more
H5N8 avian flu found in Indiana
Reading Time: 3 minutes Reuters — A strain of avian flu that until now had been found only in the western U.S. has cropped up in Indiana, bringing the total number of states affected by the virulent outbreak to 15, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said Monday. The eastward spread of any strain of the highly contagious H5 virus […] Read more
H5N8-positive wild duck found in B.C.
Reading Time: < 1 minute Ongoing surveillance of Canada’s wild birds has turned up the country’s first-ever case of highly pathogenic H5N8 avian flu, in a duck carcass at a British Columbia bird sanctuary. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency on Friday reported the case to the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE), noting such a detection in wild birds “should […] Read more
A message from April Stewart, Country Guide's Associate Editor
