The ministry is calling on chicken farmers and others to take measures to prevent a further flu outbreak.
The Okayama prefectural government in Japan said that a highly pathogenic bird flu outbreak has been confirmed at a chicken farm in the city of Kurashiki in the western Japan prefecture.
It is the first such case found this season at farms in Japan. The Okayama government requested the dispatch of Self-Defense Forces personnel to cull around 170,000 chickens at the Kurashiki farm.
According to the agriculture ministry, no avian influenza outbreak had occurred at any farms in Japan as early as October. Previously, the earliest case in a season was the one confirmed on Nov. 5 in 2020.
As the bird flu has been spreading in Europe and Asia for a few years, the ministry is calling on chicken farmers and others to take measures to prevent a further flu outbreak.
