Safe-to-eat” campaign prepared by SA poultry industry

2008/09/08

The moment Bird Flu hits South Africa, the poultry industry will be ready to act fast. Chicken and eggs account for 60% of all animal protein consumed in South Africa. Experience in the EU countries, where there has been an outbreak of Bird flu in one country every year since the H5N1 variant was first isolated in Hong Kong in the the 90’s is that chicken and egg sales plunge on the news by as much as 50% as consumers run scared.

To contain this threat, the South African Poultry Association has gathered a war chest and readied a “Safe-to-Eat” multi-media marketing and publicity campaign designed to allay consumer fears about eating poultry and eggs..The advertising campaign will appear in the daily press, on radio and on product packaging. There’s also a strong in-store Point-of-Purchase display material drive. The whole campaign will be ready to roll within hours of the goverment declaring a Bird Flu outbreak in South Africa.

Reality and perception

The risk of the bird flu or Avian Influenza, as it is more formally known, cannot be minimised. Nor can the risks. At the moment the virus only infects humans and birds who come into contact with infected birds. The big fear is that it will at some point ‘jump species’ so that humans can infect each other. This is what happened with the “Spanish” flu of 1918 /1919 when some 40 million people died world wide.

In its present form it is still very dangerous despite new anti-viral drugs which governments around the world have been stockpiling and modern antibiotics. Freezing does not kill the virus. However cooking infected poultry for one minute at a core temperature of 70 degrees does kill it. This advice and an injunction to wash one’s hands after preparing and handling poultry is also at the heart of the campaign.

There is no scientific evidence that the virus is transferred to humans through eating eggs. However, as a precaution in the case of an outbreak, the advice will be to not eat runny eggs. So fried eggs with no runny bits and hard boiled eggs will be safe to eat.

Research in South Africa shows that people believe the disease is Asian and only infects wild birds and ostriches. But that will change the moment there is an outbreak among chicken and other poultry. One only has to look at the impact of the previous outbreak of a bird flu variant among ostriches in South Africa, a couple of years back, to see the impact of consumer fear on long term sales. Ostrich meat was gaining popularity. The outbreak hit sales hard which have still to recover completely.

There are essentially two ways that bird flu in its present form can reach South Africa. This is through wild infected birds migrating here and through trade. Through international and local inspection services, this is unlikely to be in the form of infected bids being imported into the country. The last three outbreaks of animal disease in South Africa have been traced to the illegal importation of swill from ships in Durban harbour. The swill made its way to backyard producers in the hills outside Durban. The last outbreak of Swine fever, for example, happened this way.

So the possibility of an outbreak of the H5N1 flu virus happening in South Africa is very real. There were, for example, outbreaks of highly contagious bird flu in more than 50 countries in 2006. But, when it will happen here cannot be predicted. It took Newcastle disease, more than 60 years from its discovery in the UK to reach South Africa.

The plan

The impact of an outbreak on sales of healthy birds, however will be disastrous for producers, retailers and for the country alike, given that poultry and eggs account for the majority of protein consumed in South Africa.

To reduce negative consumer reaction and the loss of sales of healthy birds, the South African Poultry Association has put in place a multifaceted communications programs to be rolled out the moment the goverment announces and outbreak of bird flu.

While state veterinary services will cordon off and contain a wide area around the outbreak, the poultry producers plan will go into action. Within 7 - 10 days packaging on a large amount of the poultry declared free of disease by goverment inspectors will carry “Safe-to-Eat labels”. The logo on the labels has a thumbs up sign with the thumb morphed into a chickens head and the fingers into eggs. Producers have the designs ready to print with their packaging and others will pre-print stick-on labels to be put on their packaging immediately. At the same time a “Safe-to-Eat” ad campaign will appear in newspapers and be heard on air. It is designed to reach every consumer segment in the country. This will be extended to Point-of-Purchase in-store display material. The campaign will also remind the public to cook their poultry properly and to wash their hand thoroughly after handling the uncooked product. A public relations drive will also kick in the moment an outbreak is declared. The media will be referred to the South African Press Association and a panel of goverment and industry experts will be on hand to provide expert comment on the disease and what is being done to contain its spread and safeguard the public.

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