Bird Flu Rumour in Bangladesh : Impact on Broiler Enterprise

Poultry farming on commercial and scientific line was started practically during eighties in Bangladesh. Gainful impacts in terms of employment generation and poverty alleviation are observed in this sector but in recent past it was seriously affected by the rumour of bird flu. Bird flu or Avian Influenza is a viral disease capable of causing extremely high mortality amongst infected poultry. The virus had spread at an incredible rate over the course of the months of January and February 2004 hitting about ten countries in South-East Asia and in USA. Wide coverage of the news of bird flu in the world by different TV channels and newspapers created a suspicion of spreading bird flu in Bangladesh at that time. The death of few thousand commercial poultry birds made this suspicion more strong but the death was caused for wrong vaccination. Though it was proved by the reports of WHO and other organizations that Bangladesh was free from bird flu, the broiler farm owners had to bear huge financial losses due to rumour. This study is an attempt to find out the impact of bird flu rumour on production, marketing and consumption of broiler enterprise in Bangladesh.