Why did the chicken cross the ocean? [Mississippi on dispute with shrim growers from China, Vietnam and Cambodia]

Feb. 10, 2012 |
Hattiesburgh America

Have you heard the one about why the chicken crossed the ocean? Stick with me for a few words on Mississippi agriculture, aquaculture, and politics. Mississippi has an acrimonious history with Asian exporters of shrimp, crawfish and Delta pond-raised catfish. Growers and processors from China, Cambodia, Vietnam and other countries in the region have been the primary trade adversaries for U.S. producers.

The Asian export product is not the grain-fed channel catfish to which Mississippians are accustomed. For decades, "basa" and "tra" have been grown by Vietnamese and Cambodian fish farmers in floating cages along the Mekong River.

While U.S. producers have apparently exaggerated some reports of unsanitary or unsafe production conditions, there exist legitimate concerns over the lack of federal inspections and testing of the Asian seafood products and production practices.

The political war over catfish has been waged for over a decade with Mississippi lawmakers like U.S. Sen. Thad Cochran taking a leading role with encouragement from a catfish industry based in great measure in Mississippi.

What do the "catfish wars" have to do with Mississippi chickens and U.S. trade policy? Mississippi State University researcher Dr. Xiu-Feng (Henry) Wan has discovered the first molecular evidence linking live poultry markets in China to human H5N1 avian influenza or "bird flu."

Press reports make clear that the goal of Wan's research is to find the sources of human H5N1 infections and provide the foundations for policy-making for protecting public health - not to impact trade. Wan began studying avian influenza while in graduate school in southern China in 1996. He is credited as the first scientist to identify the highly pathogenic H5N1 avian influenza virus.

But the implications of how Wan's research might impact trade, the U.S. poultry industry and Chinese trade restrictions and tariffs on U.S. poultry exported to China are obvious. In 2011, China put in place a tariff of as much as 105.4 percent on U.S. broiler products. That cost U.S. poultry producers 90 percent of their export business with China or a cool $1 billion.

A study by Rabobank - the world's largest agricultural lender - suggests that the former model of U.S. poultry producers growing broilers with maximum chicken breast size to produce white meat for domestic markets is a failing strategy to compete both in global markets and in a changing U.S. market.

Food safety issues and food supply issues impact business, trade, banking and family farms in Mississippi - currently fourth in the nation in producing chickens to feed the nation and the world. So why did the chicken cross the ocean? The numbers say the answer is to provide direct and indirect jobs to about 48,000 Mississippians and $2.11 billion to this state's economy.

Reopening Asian, Russian and Middle Eastern markets to exports is the key to reinvigorating Mississippi's struggling poultry industry. And that's no joke.

Sid Salter is a syndicated columnist. Reach him at sidsalter@sidsalter.com.