RADIO NEW ZEALAND INTERNATIONAL

THE PAPUA NEW GUINEA chicken industry is calling for tighter quarantine controls on the importation of uncooked Australian chickens.

General manager of Zenag Chicken, Stanley Leahy, said Australia is dumping chickens on the PNG market, undercutting local producers.

He says the industry provides works for tens of thousands of people in PNG and while Australia might be in the middle of a price war, dumping excess raw product in PNG is damaging.

Mr Leahy says PNG wants the same bio-security controls that Australia applies to foods it is importing.

“From a quarantine perspective we should be able to stop a lot of these uncooked imports coming in,” Mr Leahy said.

“More seriously than just the short term harm it is causing our industry, there are also serious disease threats.

“Papua New Guinea is amongst a handful of countries in the world that are free of the worst avian diseases, far cleaner disease status than Australia has.

“So one of our biggest concerns about this stuff coming in from Australia, as well as the fact that everyone is having to slow down production, is the disease risk.”