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Eggheads is the go-to podcast for egg industry professionals who are interested in leadership and innovation in the egg world. Host Greg Schonefeld explores the evolving world of modern egg farming, from the latest in cage-free innovations and organic certifications to navigating the economics of large-scale production. Whether you're an egg producer, supplier, or involved in poultry genetics, this show provides the insights and expert discussions you need to thrive in the industry. Crack open the science, strategies, and stories behind the egg industry’s biggest challenges and opportunities.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
Since this February, we are again free from HPAI, so no outbreaks in commercial farms. So you see the results.
Greg Schonefeld:
I'm Greg Schonefeld and this is Eggheads. On this show, we've talked an awful lot about vaccines and the debate about whether we should be using them to protect our flocks from high path avian influenza. We've had many voices on the show, including Dr. Kay Russo, who feel that vaccination is the best path forward for the industry. But on the other side of the aisle, there's the broiler market who oppose vaccinating against HPAI out of concern that it would negatively impact their ability to export products abroad. With the opposing interest between the two groups, it's the USDA who must decide how to move forward for the best interest of its constituents and public health. We've been stuck and right now it's hard to imagine anyone or anything breaking the deadlock. Today, we're trying to show that there is hope, that there could be a way to navigate through the stalemate while making sure that both the egg and broiler industries are given the chance to thrive, and finding the roadmap to how we get there might require looking well beyond our own borders.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
My name is Charles Martins-Ferreira, and I'm currently deputy agriculture counselor at the French Embassy in Washington. I'm covering the United States and also Canada, and I'm more particularly in charge of sanitary and phytosanitary issues. So it covers also veterinary issues, but also food issues, animal welfare. I have been the French Minister of Agriculture for nearly 30 years. My first position abroad was as a veterinary counselor for the Near and Middle East. I covered 23 countries, I guess, for negotiating market access to Arabic countries and dealing with SPS issues, sanitary issues, veterinary issues. And later on, it was in 2015, I moved to Beijing also as a veterinary counselor advisor at the embassy also dealing with market access issues. It was very tough at that time. Just before coming to Washington, I was in Paris at the Directeur régional for Food, Minister of Agriculture, and I was the head of the European and International Affairs Department. But my main task now is following all these sanitary issues and situation related to bird flu.
Greg Schonefeld:
Just like the U.S., France got hit with bird flu extremely hard, but their outbreak looked a little different from ours.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
In 2017 in France, we face a real wave of outbreaks of avian flu, in particular for ducks because in France for the production of foie gras, fat liver, they are raised in open air, open fields, so they are much more vulnerable to the disease. So we faced a huge wave during two years, 2015, 2017. Then, it has been very quiet and back again, beginning of 2020, we had new outbreaks.
Greg Schonefeld:
And from there, it just exploded.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
Since 2020, for example, in the average, we had more or less 400 outbreaks per year. It was a lot. And it culminated at 1,400 outbreaks only for the winter, 2021/2022.
Greg Schonefeld:
Wow.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
So in six months, we had to face more than 1,000 outbreaks. It was a lot. It was very exhausting. It was a lot of money because it has costed the state nearly 1 billion euros.
Greg Schonefeld:
And it wasn't just the scale of the outbreak that resembled the situation in the U.S., but also the politics around how to respond.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
At that time, vaccination in Europe against avian flu was possible with a very particular process leading to a kind of waiver, but it was in general forbidden.
Greg Schonefeld:
And when they began seriously discussing the possibility of vaccinating against the disease, you can probably guess what one of the biggest barriers turned out to be.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
So from the outset of this reflection, immediately we found out people in favor and immediately also those were completely against. Why? Because we had immediately in mind problems of impacts on trade.
Greg Schonefeld:
But despite the export concerns, in 2021, the French effort to develop a vaccine began in earnest.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
From the scientific point of view, we had also to work on these vaccine candidates or candidate vaccines to experiment in real conditions, if these vaccines were really efficient and preventive on ducks. So the French National Agency, ANSES, carried out some trials on the field and also on the laboratory during six months. And it was in 2023 also released a report, very important, saying that finally, the two vaccines experimented were rather well-efficient in that sense that they were able to produce immunization in ducks. It could also lower the excretion of virus and at least lower the transmission of virus from one animal to another one.
Greg Schonefeld:
So they had two candidate vaccines that they felt had a good chance of protecting their ducks from bird flu outbreaks. But before they could get those vaccines into their ducks and get the foie gras industry humming again, they had to deal with a different French invention, bureaucracy.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
So we had this, I would say three different channels to follow, the regulatory one with the European Commission, the scientific one also about efficiency of vaccines, and the epidemiological aspect and also all the different stakeholders, and trying to find pathway to go towards the solution because we were from the very beginning, convinced that vaccination should be a solution.
Of course, those who were in favor were producing meat or foie gras and eggs also, it's true. Those who were against were from the genetic sector with the exports to third countries because we have very good quality genetics in France for different species, laying hens, broilers, turkeys, but also ducks. They have been convinced also, because even in the hatchery farms where the biosecurity measures are very, very high, we had also cases. So at the moment, they said, okay, now we can go. They were facing already bans, embargoes from importing countries just because there were outbreaks all around their farms, so they could not take support anymore.
Greg Schonefeld:
So they were facing embargoes before the vaccination program?
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
Exactly, exactly.
Greg Schonefeld:
Okay.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
So we were facing already embargoes due to the outbreaks. So at the moment, we had to leave the situation, buy something new. And finally, everyone was okay, in favor at the end of all these discussions to go to this experiment, and because we received from ANSES, these national agencies, the very first results which were favorable.
Greg Schonefeld:
So they managed to demonstrate that their vaccines were safe and effective. They got the European Commission on side, and then these embargoes meant genetics exporters couldn't sell their poultry abroad anyhow, so why not try this vaccine? The last piece they needed to start the campaign was a decision from leadership.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
At the end, it was the minister itself and minister of agriculture decided to on, he had to decide something and finally decided, yes, I give the green light for launching the vaccination campaign.
Greg Schonefeld:
Okay.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
But before asking the minister, of course, we brought to him a lot of notes with different advices from different parts. And we were able finally, to convince also the minister once we had all these different steps already passed. So the change of regulation at the European level, then the favorable scientific advices for the efficiency of the vaccine, and then also from the well, stakeholder community, also green light in favor of the launching of the vaccination campaign.
Greg Schonefeld:
Getting that same stakeholder approval here in the U.S., as I said off the top, that's proven to be a little bit trickier.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
Maybe, maybe the broiler sector here in the U.S., it is more vocal than the genetic sectors in France. That's why politicians and in particular secretary for agriculture here in the U.S. is more listening to the voice of the broiler sector. The problem is that they cannot decide for the whole... It's my personal opinion, for the whole poultry sector. It's not only a question of animal disease, it's also a very serious zoonotic problem. We've seen, particularly in the U.S., the spreading of the virus in the dairy cattle and also to humans. So I would say that you have also to put in balance all these different aspects. And we don't have this zoonotic aspect in France finally, because we don't have any cases in humans, but we consider that to avoid this situation we are facing now in the United States, we had to vaccinate.
Greg Schonefeld:
Even after getting all the necessary approvals and rolling out the vaccine, the work doesn't end there. That's when another very important and potentially expensive aspect of the process begins, surveillance.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
Nowadays, when you try tackle zoonotic disease, you have also to demonstrate that within the vaccinated flocks, the virus is not circulating, so you have to implement a very strict surveillance system. And in terms of cost, you could see that half of the money was dedicated to the vaccine itself and vaccination operation, but the other half was devoted to the surveillance itself with a lot of samples to be taken, a lot of analysis, the systems also of databases to coordinate everything and to have a very close image of the sanitary situation, the flocks, the ones who have vaccinated the animals also moving from one farm to another one and to the slaughter.
So we could have this very clear picture through this databases, gathering all this information related to vaccination act and also related to the results of surveillance. And you had to put the whole thing in the same system with a very good coordination, I would say, to be able to demonstrate that what you are producing and what you are exporting is completely safe. I've learned recently that the secretary for agriculture in the U.S., Brooke Rollins, should unveil in July a strategic plan for vaccination. It will be very interesting to see if endorsed to the vaccination strategy or plan, there will be also a strict surveillance of the vaccinated flocks.
Greg Schonefeld:
You mentioned the zoonotic, so the potential impact to human health was a consideration. Could you list maybe the top three to five considerations that ultimately made people decide in favor of vaccine in France?
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
Yes. So zoonotic potential, of course, this would be the main one. Second one-
Greg Schonefeld:
Which is impact to humans, potentially.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
Yeah, exactly. The economic one also, starting to re-boost the production because we are facing so many outbreaks that the production decreased in particularly in the foie gras sector. We had also the societal expectations in terms of sustainability, which is very crucial in Europe, in France in particular, stopping this massacre of animals and trying to do something differently. And also because there was a feeling of exhausting. People were exhausted, completely exhausted, professionals, officials, officers in the administration trying to tackle and to manage the disease. It was horrible. When you are facing 1,400 outbreaks in less than six months in a quite small sector, because the whole production is concentrated in few districts, I would say, in France. So you can imagine how people can be tired by, exhausted by such challenges. And if we are talking about money because it's a final denouement of this crisis, well, I said that during the winter, '21/'22, it costs more or less 1 billion euros for the governments in direct and indirect costs. Now, the vaccination program itself with the surveillance included, is about 100 million euros.
Greg Schonefeld:
Wow. What has been the impact on HPAI?
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
Today, we are free from the disease. Last August, we had new outbreaks in small farms. We had 15 outbreaks from August 2024 until February 2025. And since this February, we are again free from HPAI, so no outbreaks in commercial farms. So you see the results.
Greg Schonefeld:
Yeah, that's an incredible difference.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
Oh, yeah.
Greg Schonefeld:
So there was a concern in the whole process of deciding whether or not to implement a vaccination program. There was a concern on exports. What actually happened with those?
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
So we launched the program in October 2023, and we faced less than 15 embargoes. And the main ones were from, I would say more strategically were from, well, Japan, but also U.S. and Canada. We were a bit surprised because we have exchanged a lot with the American and Canadian administrations before launching the operation. I exchanged a lot information just to warn them, to prepare them to this vaccination program. And just one week before 1st of October, they said, "If you maintain your vaccination program, you will be in the embargo." So we have restrictions on everything except products heat treated. So it was quite nothing for us because we don't sell a lot of canned foods, I would say, from poultry meat, so we could consider that everything was forbidden to be exported to North America. We had also problems with one of our very near neighbor, UK.
China, we had already embargoes because they were not recognizing the zoning principles. Now, they have recognized it and they are able also to recognize the benefits from vaccination. So we have reinstated the exports with North America, so US and Canada, they came jointly because they were working very closely, we're exchanging all the answers we gave to the U.S., they were all immediately transmitted to Canada. Those going to Canada were immediately sent to USDA, and they came together for a expert audit in last September in France. They could see everything we have described in our questionnaires because we receive maybe a hundred and a hundred of questions about the implementation of vaccination from the different aspects. Very, very precise questions. So it was a Christmas gift that we'd say on 24th of December, Canada told us that we are lifting the ban on quite almost the products just for ducks. And a few weeks after, we had an exchange with Rosemary Sifford, and she said, "Well, in a few days, you'll have also a lifting of your ban." So it was just before the new administration arrived. And so it was also for us a very good answer, and we are very happy and it was just a relief for all of us.
Last week, I was in Paris for the General Session of the World Organisation for Animal Health, for example. The current director general, she's a lady, Emmanuelle Soubeyran, she was formerly the French CVO, and she built completely when she was French CVO, this vaccination campaign. And she tries now to say, don't be afraid. Don't be afraid there. Vaccinate, and you'll see trade will resume anyway.
Greg Schonefeld:
The results of the French vaccination campaign really speak for themselves. They're virtually free of outbreaks, and ultimately, they were able to convince trading partners to lift the embargo. And it's tempting to think that if the U.S. were to go the same way, we'd be able to reap all the same benefits. But America isn't France, and while their industry seems to be concentrated in a relatively small geographic region, producers are spread out all across the U.S., which presents unique logistical issues.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
One thing have been said when I was presenting the French situation is, well, we cannot in the U.S. vaccinate all the birds. But I say we were not vaccinate all the birds either in France, we just focused on ducks. Why ducks? Because they are very sensitive to the virus, because they are raised mostly in open fields, because they excrete a lot of virus, because we faced a lot of outbreaks within this sector compared to the laying hens or broilers. That's why we decided to focus the vaccination on this particular sector. And by tackling ducks flocks, the objective was to lower the whole viral pressure on the poultry sector, and we succeeded.
So my advice, if I can give one, I'm not really an expert, but I would say try also to find the weak point in your whole poultry sector. And what I see, it's of course, laying hens. They are facing so many outbreaks. So maybe just trying to tackle those who are more vulnerable, I would say. Because by doing that, you can lower also the viral pressure on the whole poultry sector maybe in some places, maybe you don't have to vaccinate everywhere.
We decided to vaccinate everywhere in France. I mean, the whole mainland territory, not in Corsica, for example, not in overseas territories, but only on mainland France. And so most of our duck farms are in the western part of France, but it has been sufficient to lower the pressure of the virus on the whole poultry sector. Also, unlike in the U.S., in France, spreading of the virus was particularly due to human factors. I understand that in the U.S., outbreaks appear due to a direct contamination from migratory birds, from wild birds, something different than in France. So the human factor is less prominent, I would say in the U.S. compared to France.
Greg Schonefeld:
I understand that there's been some criticism within U.S. administration of vaccination programs and pointing to Mexico and how it's working there. What's a better comparative for the United States? Mexico, or France, and why?
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
Yes, I've seen that at the very beginning of some declarations and comunique I would say about vaccination and underlying the example of Mexico. I don't want to criticize Mexico because I'm not an expert and I'm not allowed to do that. But maybe the main difference would be rely on the surveillance system. Because it's true that if you vaccinate and if you don't have a close look to the virus circulation, you cannot be 100% sure that what you export maybe is not already infected by the virus, masked by the vaccination. That's why, for this very particular purpose of addressing HPAI, you need in parallel of your vaccination program to implement a very strict surveillance. I repeat what I said. It has cost exactly the same amount of money. It's very costly. That's why I'm not promoting, I would say the French program. I'm not saying try to do the same. I just think this has given us good results. That's all. But we are fully aware that this kind of scheme is very expensive and very costly, and not all the countries can afford to put in implementation to implement it.
Greg Schonefeld:
So to your point about just the results, I mean, you talked about the cost, but a billion euros down to 100 million euros, exports, some embargoes early on, but have already been able to make progress there. You mentioned at one point, that actually the genetics exporters are happy now, so that seems like a big win to take maybe the biggest skeptic early on and now have a proponent. So it sounds like success all around.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
Exactly.
Greg Schonefeld:
Yeah.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
The real problem we have now is to do the money, I would say, because from the very beginning of the program, during the first year, 85 persons was taken in charge by the government, and the last 15 persons were in the hands of the private sector. So we still had this cost sharing between government and private sector by decreasing also the share taken by the government. So now we have decreased to 70%, but we like to lower the burden, of course, for the governments and to increase the responsibility from the private sector.
But I think that we'll be much less reluctant, I would say, because they have seen the very good results with vaccination, so they don't want to get rid of it immediately. They are very, very concerned if we stop vaccination to return back to a previous situation, which was a nightmare for everyone. But they are fully aware that they have to now to get more involved in the payment of the whole system. So progressively, the share taken by the government will decrease and the part taken by the private sector will increase. And also because production have increased production of foie gras, the exports, so the economic health has been improved also for the whole sector.
Greg Schonefeld:
We can't necessarily look to the French experience and conclude that it will also work for us. Politically, geographically, economically, there are major differences there. But nonetheless, I find it inspiring to see a country that was hit similarly hard by HPAI and experience similar pushback to vaccine adoption, who still found a way to make it work.
As Charles said, even after they provided reports and information on what they were doing, they were still hit with embargoes just a week before they went live with their vaccination program. So vaccination does come with its own risks, but they might be less than the risks we take in not acting at all.
An important takeaway here is that the work Charles and his colleagues did to demonstrate that the vaccines were effective, implement surveillance programs, and lobby for regulatory changes, that was all pivotal. But ultimately the thing that got them over the finish line was their leadership deciding to act. And now as a result, they're in a much better spot than they were a few years ago. And I think that sort of proactive and coordinated approach is something we really need to see in this country, too. And what I came to learn from Charles is that the differences between the U.S. and France extend beyond the farms to our dining rooms.
I just have one more question for you, Charles. How do you prefer your eggs?
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
It will be a la coque, they are boiled, but they are not hard, so it's just in between.
Greg Schonefeld:
So I'm looking at a picture of this now, and it's sitting in a very nice like dish. It's a brown egg. The top of the egg is cut off, but the shell is still on. It's just very visually appealing.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
Yeah.
Greg Schonefeld:
This looks like an experience.
Charles Martins-Ferreira:
Yeah, it's an experience, and it's not really for breakfast. I would say it's more for, well, the dinner or the lunch maybe. It's very Parisian also. You go on the terrace, you have a coffee or you have, I don't know, some glass of wine and you ask for a la coque. So it's very, very French, I think.
Greg Schonefeld:
Make sure you follow Eggheads on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, and connect with us on Instagram and LinkedIn too. If you want to be a guest or have topic ideas, please send us a message. Until next time, I'm Greg Schonefeld and we'll talk to you soon.