Agriculture Minister Simon Coveney has predicted the US will move to lift its ban on EU beef, once procedural requirements around the publication of BSE rules are completed.

IRISH fish farmers have been hit by an outbreak of ostreid herpes virus in oysters.

YOU can’t get it from eating pig meat, it had never been seen before in pigs ... but scientists called it swine flu.

A MARKET for Irish beef that was worth in the region of €15.25 million when it was closed eight years ago is to be reopened.

A DOWNWARD trend in Brazil’s cattle cycle, due to reduced profitability for store producers in recent years, has reduced cattle supplies, and the strong domestic market has responded with sharp price increases.

THE Bush administration is coming under increasing pressure to open up the United States market to Irish and European beef.

Ivory Coast has reported its first cases of H5N1 bird flu, in both domestic poultry and in wild birds, the World Organisation for Animal Health said today.

The deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu was confirmed yesterday in a third African country, deepening experts’ fears that the disease is becoming endemic on the poor, ill-equipped continent and that it may already be far more widespread than reported.

INTERNATIONAL veterinary experts gathered in Paris to discuss the fight against bird flu as the lethal H5N1 strain made further advances in Africa, was confirmed in Bosnia, and French authorities started a mass vaccination programme of ducks and geese.

The deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu was today confirmed in a third African country, deepening experts’ fears that the disease is becoming endemic on the poor, ill-equipped continent and that it may already be far more widespread than reported.

Authorities reported Africa’s first case of a deadly bird-flu strain, saying officials in afflicted Nigeria need help to prevent its spread on an impoverished continent poorly equipped to fight an outbreak.

A “highly pathogenic” strain of the H5N1 bird flu virus has been found in poultry stocks in Nigeria – the first reported case of the disease in Africa, the Paris-based World Organisation for Animal Health said today.

Health officials say it is impossible to stop the spread of the deadliest bird flu strain, H5N1, via migratory birds, and are now trying to minimise its impact on domestic poultry and humans, a challenge that will become more difficult as the birds move south.

Southeast Asian agriculture ministers have agreed to launch a three-year plan next year aimed at stamping out the menace of bird flu in the region – a move they hope will win enough international aid to halt the disease before it becomes a catastrophic global epidemic with the potential to kill millions.

Vietnam reported another bird flu infection today in an outbreak that has killed 13 people in Vietnam and Cambodia over the past month, a doctor said.

THAILAND yesterday confirmed its 10th death from bird flu and said the woman may have contracted the virus from her daughter, raising the alarming possibility of human-to-human transmission of the disease.

Asia’s bird flu epidemic is a ”crisis of global importance”, two UN agencies warned as Thailand went on nationwide alert yesterday after the virus was confirmed in a woman whose case has raised concerns over human-to-human transmission.

HEALTH experts have ruled out any link between avian flu and the SARS virus following the death of a 57-year old vet in Holland last week.