ISLAMABAD, April 16: Meat sellers have sought a check on export and smuggling of livestock to curb the increase in prices of the commodity that escalated following detection of bird flu in two NWFP poultry farms last month.

Proposing a 16-point policy measure aimed at reducing meat prices, the Meat Welfare Association president Khurshid Ahmad Qureshi in a letter sent to Prime Minister’s Adviser on Finance Dr Salman Shah said the hike in the prices of meat was witnessed due to massive export and smuggling of meat and livestock to Afghanistan and Iran.

According to the letter, a copy of which was maid available to Dawn, the association has asked the government to ban export of meat to check the increase in the prices.

The average prices of meat rose by 20 per cent during the last one month following the detection of bird flu virus in two poultry farms in Charsadda and Abbottabad.

Mr Qureshi said a meat board was established by the government recently but the association was not given representation in it.

He said the government should do away with the fees charged on the trading of animals and the meat trade should be accorded a status of industry that would help in getting loan at lower rates besides other facilities.

Like in other three provinces, the government should declare Tuesday and Wednesday as meatless day in Sindh. Currently, Thursday is the meatless day in the province.

It proposed establishment of slaughter points at Atari or Amritsar to help reduce labour charges and transportation besides assuring freshness of the meat.

It said customs clearance on loading and unloading of animals at Pakistan’s border cost around Rs11,000 per truck. The association proposed reduction in the charges. It demanded that procedures for import of animals from India should further be liberalised.

The association proposed establishment of slaughter houses, wholesale markets and mini-markets of meat in the country. It also demanded installation of cold storage and chilling machines in these markets to enhance the life of meat imported from India.

It demanded that buffaloes’ colonies should be set up in the country, barren land should be allotted for cattle farming, the stamping of meat should be made mandatory to avoid unlawful slaughter, besides establishment of a model cattle farm in the federal capital.

A fresh report of Avian Influenza outbreak at a poultry farm in Sihala, some 25 kilometre from here was reported on Sunday.

“During the ongoing surveillance for Avian Influenza, a suspect outbreak was reported at a small poultry farm in Sihala in the evening of April 14”, Commissioner Livestock and Animal Husbandry, Dr Muhammad Afzal told APP news agency.

Clinically the disease was suggested as Avian Influenza, he added.