Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps her Department is taking to increase the speed of issuing poultry movement licenses in Avian Influenza zones.

Defra’s policy on movement and licensing both from infected premises and within disease control zones surrounding infected premises are set out in the Notifiable Avian Disease Control Strategy for Great Britain and Defra’s Contingency Plan for Exotic Notifiable Diseases of Animals in England. In summary, to prevent further disease spread certain movements of poultry, other captive birds, eggs, poultry products or materials associated with their keeping, or mammals from or to premises where poultry or other captive birds are kept, are only permitted within disease control zones or from premises where avian influenzas has been confirmed when licenced.

All bird keepers in disease control zones have the opportunity to apply for movement licences for some specific low risk movements from disease control zones, as do keepers on infected premises with regard to the movement of animals (excluding birds) from the infected premises.

To improve the efficiency with which movement licenses can be assessed and where possible issued, in February 2022 the Animal and Plant Health Agency’s online licensing service was launched. The licensing service enables users to check the status of their application, add further information in support of their application and download issued licences. However, all license applications are assessed on the basis of a veterinary risk assessment and licence applications must be made at least 5 days before the license needs to be used, to enable these assessments to be undertaken. All businesses have a contingency plan for responding both to disease outbreaks on their premises and in the event that they are located in a disease control zone.

To reduce the administrative burden on bird keepers, general licenses have also been made available for a number of low risk activities. General licences allow a movement or activity that would otherwise be prohibited. If a keeper is able to comply with all the requirements of the general license, they can rely on the general licence as providing authority for the movement or activity and do not need to apply for a specific license.

Licences for movements of poultry, other captive birds, eggs, poultry products or materials associated with their keeping are not required outside of disease control zones or from any Captive Bird (Monitoring) Controlled Zone. On the 27 October 2022 amendments to the Avian Influenza Order No. 2 came into force, which brought the definition of “poultry” and “non-commercial premises” into alignment with the World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH) definitions. These amendments facilitate the use of captive bird (monitoring) controlled zones (where movement licenses are not required) in England for non-commercial lower risk premises where poultry or captive birds which are kept as pets but also produce eggs.