According to Colombia's Republic newspaper, Paula Andrea Cepeda, manager of the Agricultural Research Institute (ICA), which is responsible for certification, monitoring, and control of the livestock supply chain, stated that 65% of Colombia's 5,500 poultry farms have obtained biosecurity certification, which greatly enhances product competitiveness.
"We are currently negotiating poultry meat trade matters with markets including China, Malaysia, South Korea, Egypt, the United States, Lebanon, Venezuela, Vietnam, Guatemala, Dominican Republic, and Chile; simultaneously, we are also negotiating egg trade matters with markets such as Aruba, Japan, Curaçao, Trinidad and Tobago, Haiti, Guyana, El Salvador, the United States, Uruguay, and Japan," Cepeda said.
In recent decades, Colombia's poultry industry has developed rapidly, with current annual production of chicken meat and eggs reaching 3 million tons. According to the National Poultry Farmers Association (Fenavi), Colombia is the world's tenth-largest poultry producer and the third-largest in Latin America.
Colombia's poultry industry not only meets domestic demand but also has the capacity to export over 350,000 tons of chicken meat and 1 billion eggs. "Last year, we produced 1.9 million tons of chicken meat, compared to just 700,000 tons 20 years ago; egg production also reached 18 billion eggs, up from 6 billion 20 years ago," recalled Gonzalo Moreno, the association's president. "In 2005, we established a regulatory framework for safe poultry farms, which enabled us to achieve world-class hygiene standards."
Moreno noted that Colombia currently faces a significant opportunity: Canada, the United States, and Mexico are affected by avian flu, while Colombia maintains a disease-free status. Colombia has been striving to sell chicken meat and eggs to the US market but has not yet met sanitary entry conditions.
Francisco Ross, director of the National Food and Drug Surveillance Institute (Invima), responsible for final export product certification, stated: "Entering the US market is a long, cautious, and meticulous process. We have been working with agricultural and health regulatory agencies for years to certify all meat products."
Additionally, Colombia is seeking to enter the Chinese market.