Project description
New measures to keep chickens healthy
The European Union is one of the world’s largest poultry meat producers and a net exporter of poultry products with an annual production of around 15 million tonnes. Ensuring high levels of biosecurity is an important part of poultry farming and key to controlling communicable poultry illnesses as chickens are particularly sensitive to epidemics and foodborne pathogens. To that end, the EU-funded NETPOULSAFE project will compile, validate and share supporting measures that have been implemented, or are close to being implemented, in large poultry producing countries. Moreover, field and literature data will be analysed from a technical and socio-economic point of view and validated in pilot farms or directly disseminated to farmers.
Objective
Poultry sector is one of the main agricultural production in Europe, providing 15.2M tonnes of poultry meat and over 7.5 M tonnes of eggs in 2018, with a 21.2 billion € turnover in poultry meat in 2015 and 960 M€ worth of eggs in 2016.It is also a very sensitive sector regarding epidemics, that can impact the sector economics (e.g. 2015 and 2017 episodes of Avian Influenza). and also foodborne pathogens (Salmonella, Campylobacter…) that may have an impact on public health. Biosecurity is acknowledged as the appropriate answer for preventing diseases spread and safeguarding competitive and sustainable poultry farms. Best practices are known all over Europe but compliance of farmers and other operators (e.g. transport, hatcheries…) to biosecurity may not be optimum. Stakeholders need to be supported for effectively implement biosecurity practices. NETPOULSAFE aims to improve biosecurity compliance in poultry farming by compiling, validating and sharing supporting measures implemented or close to being into practice in 7 large poultry producing countries, thanks to a network of 7 National Poultry AKIS. These multi-actor groups, gathering around 500 people, will be chaired and interconnected through Network Facilitators who will stimulate knowledge cross-fertilisation and exchange both at National and EU scales. Supporting measures will be collected from field and literature and analysed from technical and socio-economic point of view to be either validated in pilot farms or directly disseminated to farmers, operators and advisors (incl. vets). In-depth analysis of National contexts will enable to define tailored dissemination strategies. Material (incl. audio-visuals, factsheets, Practice Abstracts, e-learning modules) will be co-constructed with the National Poultry AKIS to ensure its acceptance and shared through most consulted channels and dedicated platform. Synergies with on-going activities, especially EIP-AGRI Operational Groups, will increase project impacts.
Fields of science
Keywords
Programme(s)
- H2020-EU.3.2. - SOCIETAL CHALLENGES - Food security, sustainable agriculture and forestry, marine, maritime and inland water research, and the bioeconomy Main Programme
- H2020-EU.3.2.1.1. - Increasing production efficiency and coping with climate change, while ensuring sustainability and resilience
- H2020-EU.3.2.1.3. - Empowerment of rural areas, support to policies and rural innovation
- H2020-EU.3.2.2.3. - A sustainable and competitive agri-food industry
- H2020-EU.3.2.4.1. - Fostering the bio-economy for bio-based industries
- H2020-EU.3.2.1.4. - Sustainable forestry
- H2020-EU.3.2.1.2. - Providing ecosystems services and public goods
Funding Scheme
CSA - Coordination and support actionCoordinator
75009 Paris
France
The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.