Strengthening solutions to prevent illegal hunting of swiftlets

Tăng cường giải pháp ngăn chặn tình trạng săn bắt trái phép chim yến - Ảnh 1. — The situation of hunting swiftlets to extinction occurs in many localities.

Swiftlets are officially recognized as livestock animals in the 2018 Law on Animal Husbandry. In recent times, the bird nest farming industry has developed strongly; up to now, 42/63 provinces and centrally-run cities have raised bird nests with about 24,000 bird nest houses, an output of 120 - 150 thousand tons/year, worth about 500 million USD, creating many jobs and a large source of income for people. Vietnam is one of four countries (Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand) approved by China to officially export bird nest products.

However, according to the report of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development and the reflection of a number of relevant agencies, the current management of bird's nest farming still has some shortcomings and inadequacies, specifically: (i) the development of bird's nest farming facilities is mainly spontaneous, not in accordance with the provisions of the law on animal husbandry, causing difficulties for management and reducing investment efficiency; (ii) the situation of hunting and exterminating bird's nests occurs in many localities, causing a decline in the bird's nest population both in the wild and at farming facilities, causing public outrage; (iii) The preliminary processing and processing of bird's nest products is mainly fragmented and small-scale, not fully meeting the food safety requirements of the importing country.

To urgently overcome the above shortcomings and inadequacies, and promote the official export of bird's nest products, the Prime Minister requested that Ministers and Chairmen of People's Committees of provinces and centrally-run cities focus and prioritize resources, proactively direct and drastically and synchronously implement the following solutions:

1. Chairman of the People's Committee of the province or centrally-run city

a) Direct local authorities to resolutely and synchronously deploy solutions to prevent and end illegal hunting of swiftlets, focusing on: (i) organizing propaganda and mobilizing people not to hunt and consume swiftlets, promptly reporting illegal hunting of swiftlets; (ii) regularly organizing forces to inspect, prevent, dismantle, and recover illegal trapping and catching means and tools; (iii) strictly handling illegal hunting, trapping, transporting, and consuming of swiftlets; organizing to completely destroy illegal trading spots of wild birds and swiftlets in the area.

b) Urgently advise the Provincial People's Council to consider deciding on the area for raising swiftlets in accordance with the provisions of Decree No. 13/2020/ND-CP dated January 21, 2020 detailing the Law on Animal Husbandry.

c) Organize guidance and inspection of declaration of bird's nest farming facilities, registration of bird's nest farming facility codes in accordance with the law on animal husbandry to serve the management and traceability work under the guidance of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development.

d) Direct local professional agencies to effectively prevent and control poultry diseases; develop disease-free livestock facilities and areas to minimize the risk of disease spreading to swiftlet flocks; direct the work of ensuring food safety during the production, harvesting, transportation and processing of local bird's nest products.

d) Promote scientific research, application of information technology, digital transformation in raising, disease prevention and control, management of swiftlet farming, ensuring requirements of traceability, food safety, meeting export requirements of products from bird's nests.

2. Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development

a) Preside over and coordinate with ministries, branches and localities to review and perfect mechanisms, policies and regulations in the management of raising, processing and exporting products from bird's nests, resolutely cut unnecessary administrative procedures that cause inconvenience to people and businesses, promote decentralization and delegation of power to localities along with resource allocation and inspection and control tools.

b) Promptly issue specific instructions and related standards to facilitate localities in organizing production according to the value chain, ensuring disease safety, food safety and traceability of product origin according to the requirements of importing countries.

c) Develop a database for managing livestock facilities; prioritize the allocation of resources and funding to develop an information management system and online database related to facilities for raising, exploiting and processing bird's nest products to serve the monitoring of biosafety, disease safety, food safety and traceability for the export of bird's nest products.

d) Proactively and actively coordinate with the Ministry of Industry and Trade, Vietnamese Embassies in other countries and relevant agencies, striving to complete the assessment and export of bird's nest products to China by 2023 and promote the expansion of official exports to other markets.

3. Ministry of Industry and Trade

Actively research foreign markets, promote the introduction and promotion of bird's nest products through trade promotion activities and programs abroad, and support Vietnamese enterprises to boost the export of bird's nest products to foreign markets.

4. Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment

a) Direct and guide the management and protection of swiftlet species according to the direction of the Prime Minister in Directive No. 04/CT-TTg dated May 17, 2022.

b) Coordinate with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development and People's Committees of provinces and centrally run cities to direct and organize inspections, promptly detect and strictly handle cases of illegal hunting of swiftlets.

5. Ministry of Public Security

Direct the environmental police force to strengthen measures to combat, prevent and strictly handle violations of the law on hunting, killing, transporting, trading, processing, storing and consuming wild birds, including swiftlets.

6. Relevant ministries and branches, according to their assigned functions and tasks, proactively direct specialized functional agencies to coordinate and implement drastic and synchronous solutions to manage bird's nest farming and promote the export of bird's nest products to other countries.

Source