Haiti: Haiti strengthens measures against chicken eggs and the Dominican

The Haitian authorities have stepped up surveillance at the border to combat smuggling of chickens and eggs from the Dominican Republic, informed on Tuesday, traders at Dajabón.

The spokesman traders of northern Haiti, Roul Joseph, said in the press that during the three days, police officers and inspectors of the Department of Animal and Plant Health of the Haitian Ministry of Agriculture seized Thousands of chickens and eggs purchased in Dominican territory.

Haiti in 2007 banned the entry of poultry products from the Dominican Republic after the identification of confirmed cases of avian flu. However, smuggling of chickens and eggs has not stopped, what motivated the Haitian authorities to redouble their vigilance against this.

Mr. Joseph said that traders Haitian record large losses due to measures adopted at the border by the Haitian authorities.

The merchant called unjust Haitian authorities' decision to suspend imports of eggs and chickens are the main diet of the poor and middle class in Haiti. That is why measures that prohibit entry to the country of Dominican poultry products has caused grumbling merchants.

Binational market held Monday and Friday Dajabón, yesterday there was no chicken or eggs since the ban on Haitian authorities.

Meanwhile members of the Specialized Unit of Border Security (Cesfront) have cordoned off the vicinity of the Massacre River, which separates the Dominican Republic to Haiti, where the distributors of chickens and eggs are doing the illegal trade, with the complicity of Haitian shopkeepers.

The spokesman of the Dominican Association of Poultry, Wilfredo Cabrera, said that producers must meet the Dominican Haitian President René Préval and other senior officials from Haiti to explain that in his country there no problem for the resumption of exports of eggs and chickens.

However, he emphasized that the Haitian authorities require the packaging of eggs in crates and on chickens that specifies where they are produced. Nevertheless, he defended the quality of poultry products from the Dominican Republic and Haiti indicates a need for this market.

Mayor Dajabón (North-western Dominican Republic, near Ouanaminthe), Sonia Mateo, said that measuring the Haitian authorities affects hundreds Dominican producers and traders attending the Haitian market binational Dominican territory.