Testifying before the House Agriculture Subcommittee on Livestock and Foreign Agriculture, the general manager of a California-based egg company applauded the U.S. Department of Agriculture for its assistance in battling virulent Newcastle disease (vND), and urged members of Congress to keep the help coming.
David Will, general manager of Chino Valley Ranchers, told subcommittee members on July 16 he commended them for the mandatory funding for animal health matters such as combatting vND, but also emphasized no not “shortchange the pest and disease prevention program.”
Will told of the vND outbreak, which has plagued southern California since May 2018, and has also been detected in Utah and Arizona.
The most important thing needed to slow or stop the spread of diseases like vND is adequate staffing.
“What we needed was not vaccines but boots on the ground,” said Will.
Early detection is key to battling vND, he said, and year-round labor is needed, he added.
USDA has worked in partnership with the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) in providing responders.
Government furlough harmed vND battle
The emergency response was shortchanged when President Donald Trump ordered a partial government shutdown that lasted from Dec. 22, 2018, to January 25, 2019, that effort was compromised, Will said.
“We were all set to depopulate some infected farms. However, the people were furloughed in USDA who were responsible for issuing all of the equipment necessary to do that work, so all it did is it left several hundred thousand birds in the environment continuing to shed virus for several weeks while we worked through all that paperwork,” Will said.
Subcommittee Chairman Jim Costa, D-California, asked Will about the importance of CDFA’s involvement throughout the whole process, including the federal impasse.
Will responded: “They were absolutely huge. When it was first detected back in May of 2018, the CDFA came out and implemented a food response defense plan for all of our processing plants, all of our farms. They loaned us veterinarians to walk our properties to make sure we were doing all we could to minimize risks.”
As of July 10, Will said, 301 responders were working in the state.
Challenges to poultry producers
Will said California poultry producers have practiced strong biosecurity measures, but those biosecurity efforts can be impeded by those not in the industry.
“Unfortunaley, as California’s experience with vND has shown, biosecurity can be undermined by backyard poultry flocks located near commercial operations,” Will said.
Will pointed out that since the beginning of the outbreak, about 1.24 chickens have been lost. Of those, 1.1 million were from commercial egg operations.
“During the outbreak, it has not been uncommon to find 20 or more positive backyard flocks within a kilometer of a commercial producer. In addition, our ability to combat vND was compromised by social media networks that warned of the approach of enforcement officials and encouraged (backyard chicken owners) to move or hide potentially affected birds.”
Will also said USDA cannot forget about the biosecurity problems posed by those who trespass on farms.
“More broadly, we have a continuing problem with trespassers, often animal activists, who break into our operations and sometimes remove birds, compromising the biosecurity of the remaining flock and possibly forcing euthanasia to decrease the spread.”
In addition to representing Chino Valley Ranchers, Will also spoke on behalf of United Egg Producers, Egg Farmers of California and the Pacific Egg and Poultry Association.
