Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Irragori Aurelio Valencia and General Manager of the ICA, Luis Humberto Martinez Lacouture, toured the 17th trade show organized by Fenavi Poultry Congress in the city of Cartagena last week.

Speaking before more than 200 poultry, Minister Minister held up resource management by the poultry industry as an example to other productive sectors of the country and said the ICA should strengthen its work with the poultry guild.

Meanwhile Mr Martinez Lacouture highlighted how the poultry industry has positioned itself as one of the fundamental pillars of the economy in much of the country.

He said that the the main challenge are to ensure the health and safety of poultry products and to ensure the country continues to be free of avian influenza.

That is why the ICA has pledged to work on three key points to improve the poultry sector, he said:

• Reformulation of resolution 3642 of 2013 on biosecurity and the registration of producers, in order to guarantee the applicability of the standards necessary to improve the competitiveness of the sector.
• Cooperation with Fenavi on controlling the movement of birds in the country, which is seen as a major risk factor in the transmission of diseases of high economic importance to the industry.
• The Institute is prepared to announce a health emergency to allow the region of Santander to contain and eradicate an outbreak of highly virulent Newcastle disease.