Bird's nest boom has Malaysian producers drooling

By M. Jegathesan (AFP) – 6 days ago

SITIAWAN, Malaysia — Thousands of swiftlets erupt from their roosts, swirling into a brightening dawn in a riotous ritual that announces the start of each day in this coastal town in northern Malaysia.
But the tiny birds emerge not from natural cave roosts, but from a purpose-built swiftlet "farm" resembling an industrial building that affords easy access to the valuable nests used in bird's nest soup.
Such farms are at the centre of a Malaysian effort to capitalise on the growing world popularity of the soup, a delicacy believed in Chinese society to be an aphrodisiac and provide a range of health benefits.
Strong demand for the so-called "Caviar of the East" from newly wealthy consumers in China and India and in the Middle East is fuelling unprecedented new growth in a world market estimated by Malaysia's government at more than $6 billion.
"The Middle East is our new market. They are feeding bird's nest soup to race horses to make them run faster," said Loke Yeu Loong, managing director of the swiflet farm in the rural coastal town of Sitiawan.
"At the moment, demand outstrips supply."
The cup-shaped collections of twigs are held together by dried swiftlet saliva, which is made into a gelatinous soup credited in China with everything from alleviating asthma to arresting the ageing process.
In 2009, world production reached 3,750 tonnes, 75 percent of which came from Indonesia.
Thailand and Malaysia, where the birds also are found in huge numbers, produced most of the rest.
But safety and environmental concerns have forced a move away from the caves and disused buildings where swiftlets roost, and Malaysian harvesters are today building thousands of surrogate homes for the birds.
Loke opened his first dedicated swiftlet farm in 2009 -- several block-long rows of neatly designed three-storey buildings with sealed doors and windows and hollow interiors -- outside Sitiawan in Perak state.
Enticed by swiftlet mating songs played from loudspeakers, the birds enter via small openings and build their nests.
From just a few hundred individual bird houses in the late 1990s, there are now about 50,000 in Malaysia, according to the government.
Malaysia produced about 275 tonnes of bird's nest in 2010, worth some 1.5 billion ringgit ($470 million), and the government projects output growing to 500 tonnes by 2020.
Demand has pushed the average price of a kilogramme of Malaysia bird's nest to 4,000 ringgit today, four times what it was 20 years ago.
"Obviously at present we can't meet the huge growing consumer demand for edible bird's nest," Loke said.
His firm, Swiftlet Eco Park, is now developing or planning 14 other sites nationwide and aims to become Malaysia's top producer.
The Malaysian industry hatched in the 1980s but gained momentum after the 1997 Asian financial crisis left many property developments abandoned or unfinished.
Resourceful entrepreneurs capitalised on this -- and the lack of industry regulation -- to use many such sites as swiftlet farms.
But they ran into opposition amid complaints that the recorded bird song disturbed human residents and that droppings posed a potential health threat in the avian flu era. Calls for regulation have grown louder.
As a result, government officials say authorities have stopped approving new farms in urban areas and that legislation expected soon would ban them except in rural zones.
Environmentalists criticise the repeated snatching of the birds' diligently built nests, often before they can lay their eggs, as cruel to the swiftlets.
"Our major concern is the distress caused to the birds," said Mohamad Idris, president of the Malaysian branch of Friends of the Earth.
Mohamad Noorhisham, head of swiflet supervision for Malaysia's veterinary services agency, said legislation expected next year would ensure safe, sustainable and bird-friendly development of the industry.
Among other things, it will outlaw harvesting of nests containing chicks.
"We want the industry to be environmentally and people-friendly," he said.
But with the birds plentiful -- the government does not have precise figures -- and processed nests fetching high prices, the growth looks to continue.
Five years ago, swiftlet farmer John Peor had a handful of the purpose-built structures.
Today, his firm Yenzheka Technology has more than 60, producing about 200 kilogrammes of nests per month for export to Hong Kong and China. He hopes to raise monthly output to 500 kilogrammes.
"Buyers book in advance. I sell processed bird's nest for anything between 8,000 to 15,000 ringgit per kilogramme, depending on the grade," he said.
Producers and veterinary officials say that while concerns must be addressed, farming is more sustainable.
"In cave harvesting, where they bid huge sums of money to secure the right to harvest the bird's nest, they need to harvest as many nests as possible," Loke said, adding that meant chicks or eggs were often destroyed.
Loke says his firm does not destroy chicks or eggs, viewing them as the seeds of future growth.
Copyright © 2011 AFP. All rights reserved.

Transparency for proposed swiftlet bill, please!

September 23, 2011

FMT LETTER: From SM Mohd Idris, via e-mail
In response to the Swiftlet Bill to be tabled next year to regulate the profitable bird’s nest industry, Sahabat Alam Malaysia urges the Veterinary Services Department (VSD) to disclose more details of the new Bill.
The proposed bill should be open to public debate and consultation. What is important is that the VSD should involve the farm owners, non-swiftlet farm owners who reside near the swiftlet farms, members of the Council comprising representatives from the Government, Maritime, customs and NGOs at the pre-Bill stage to listen to their feedback.
Once all parties involved have reached an understanding and all loopholes plugged, then only should the Bill be tabled in parliament. The drafting of the new law should be an open and transparent process before any guidelines for swiftlet breeding can be passed.
In this case it is crucial to know whether the proposed Bill will be effective in fixing the problem of illegal operators, especially those who set up swiftlet farms in shophouses. Then again many ignorant and errant breeders may not conform to good farming practices to ensure that birds are not subjected to cruelty or abuse and mishandling.
Has the VSD sufficient personnel to enforce the rules, and who will monitor the activities of bird nest collectors to ensure that harvesting is done without disturbance to the birds and their young, especially when many are operating illegally?
Owing to the many public complaints there is a strong case for the bird nest industry to be shifted out from urban areas and heritage sites for reasons best known. Heritage sites have become a housing boom for birds, through the conversion of the heritage buildings for the valued nests.
This has brought about irreparable damage as original doors, plasterwood and features are removed, and sprinklers set up to keep the house humid. This causes dampness and rot to the adjacent properties.
The increasing dense networks of a swiftlet house could create virtual disease flight paths for avian flu, threatening both local bird population and humans as well. Pools of water created for the humidity could provide prime breeding sites for mosquitoes and the spread of dengue and malaria.
health concerns are secondary as swiftlet house owners seem more concerned with the flightiness of the birds themselves. A recording of bird calls screaming at high volume with the noise level above the permissible level is another frequent complaint.
SAM strongly believes that this lucrative business is best suited to areas where the birds naturally feed, over agricultural or forest areas, or in combination with agriculture, in areas of low population.
Breeding activities in specifically zoned agricultural area would address the problem of noise and other nuisance problems caused to residents in urban areas. However care must be taken to ensure that the progressive shut down of section of farms can only take place after the breeding period.
Another issue of major concern is an urgent need for the inclusion of swiftlets into the Convention on International Trade of Endangered Species of Flora and Fauna (CITES) particularly when considering the bulk of edible swiftlet nests transported across international boundaries. Consumer nations will continue to import the nests irrespective of the source.
It is imperative that information on illegal trade within the region be encouraged by all means, especially to identify illegal trade routes and the movements of the individuals concerned. It is important to review the legislation for all range states and consumer countries so as to enable all countries in the region to understand and address the issue of illegal trade.
Lastly the authority for administering legislation controlling the harvest and export of edible-nest swiftlet materials should be vested in the wildlife conservation agency due to their considerable amount of knowledge and research pertaining to the management of swiftlets.
The writer is president of Sahabat Alam Malaysia (SAM)