LAHORE, Feb 7: Prices of poultry meat, which decreased to Rs50 per kilogramme during the last week of January because of bird flu fears, have significantly stabilized now.

Poultry meat prices had touched Rs98 per kg mark in the provincial capital before the spread of rumours about bird flu in Karachi and other southern parts of Pakistan by the middle of last month.

The per kilogramme prices of poultry meat and live chicken in the city have gone up since then and stood at Rs65 and Rs46 respectively on Saturday.

"The situation will hopefully improve further with time," said Shahid Ahmad, a Sanda Road poultry meat seller.

He claimed that poultry meat in Pakistan was safe for human consumption.

The outbreak of bird flu in poultry in Thailand and adjoining South East Asian states created panic among people even in far away countries like Pakistan and India, bringing business in this sector to a virtual halt.

Pakistan Poultry Association sources said this was one of the worst crises experienced by commercial poultry farming since its inception in this part of the world in the 1960s.-APP