Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many turkeys have been culled since the outbreak of avian flu on 27 October 2021.

To date during the avian influenza outbreak (from 26 October 2021 to the 3 November 2022), 6 million poultry or other captive birds (including chickens, turkeys, geese, ducks, and other kept birds) have died or are being culled and disposed for disease control purposes (2.8 million since Oct 2022; 3.2 million birds between October 2021 and September 2022). This is a small proportion (approximately 0.6%) of overall yearly poultry production (c.20m birds slaughtered for human consumption per week).

Of the total which have died or are being culled and disposed for disease control purposes during the outbreak, approximately 1,282,000 are turkeys, 679,200 ducks and 60,800 geese (equating to approximately 21%, 11% and 1% of the total birds culled respectively) (931,000 turkeys, 336,700 ducks, and 19,000 geese (equating to approximately 33%, 12% and 1% of the total birds culled respectively) since October 2022; 351,000 turkeys, 342,500 ducks and 41,800 geese (equating to approximately 11%, 11% and 1% of the total birds culled respectively) between October 2021 and September 2022).