Arkansas poultry industry sees reduced disease impact, job market woes

FAYETTEVILLE — Despite a decrease in the influence of highly pathogenic avian influenza — HPAI — on Arkansas’ poultry industry, restructuring and closing of plants have posed increased challenges in the poultry producer-integrator dynamic.
The outbreak of HPAI has infected more than 120 million birds nationwide since it began in 2022, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The deadly virus was first detected in Arkansas in October 2022 and affected 56,000 commercial birds that year. In 2023, that number rose to over 255,000.
As of mid-December, Arkansas has seen no commercial poultry HPAI detections this year, a trend with causes rooted in Arkansas’ production demographics, according to Jada Thompson, associate professor of agricultural economics and agribusiness for the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture.
“I think for Arkansas, we’ve been pretty lucky … it hasn’t been as big of a direct impact on growers here,” she said.
She noted the outbreak’s impact is in large part based on poultry type. Poultry can be divided into broilers, layers and turkeys, with broilers being chickens for meat production, layers being chickens for egg production, and turkeys being raised for meat production.
She explained that since Arkansas has more broilers than layers or turkeys and that “most outbreaks … are where you see large concentrations” of the latter two, Arkansas has not been impacted as severely.
Thompson also attributed Arkansas’ decrease in HPAI detections to its climate and geographical location. The current HPAI strain, H5N1, travels through wildlife along the wild bird flyways, with Arkansas in the Mississippi Flyway, but does not do as well in warmer environments like Arkansas, Thompson noted.
The decrease in commercial infections does not mean Arkansas is out of the woods, as Dustan Clark, extension poultry health veterinarian for the Division of Agriculture, explained.
In December, three positive HPAI detections were found in backyard flocks in Lafayette, Craighead and Pope Counties.
He explained that with detections not matching previous years’ higher numbers, individuals can become fatigued in their efforts to mitigate the introduction of disease into a flock. Nevertheless, he urged others to practice biosecurity by recognizing signs of illness, refraining from bringing home animals suspected of being diseased and contacting the appropriate service personnel, such as a local veterinarian, the Arkansas Livestock and Poultry Division or USDA.
“Vigilance is key; if you see something in your birds that just does not look right, get help,” he said.
While Arkansas has not lost any commercial flocks due to HPAI this year, and the state ranks third for turkey production, turkeys raised nationally have gone down 6 percent since last year, according to this year’s USDA Turkeys Raised report.
Industry restructuring leads to employment trouble
Poultry processing plant closures have also had an impact on the industry, Thompson said, with restructuring efforts leading to loss of jobs and canceled contracts for growers.

In late 2023, Cooks Venture, a poultry company focused on raising a specialty chicken breed, closed unexpectedly, citing financial trouble and giving employees and stakeholders just days’ notice. Growers who had contracted with the business were left with chickens that were ultimately euthanized because they weren’t allowed to keep their birds.
“I think the concern is always the relationship between the grower and the integrator,” Thompson said of the conflict. She went on to explain that the specialty focus of the venture presented challenges.
“I think right now, the new poultry companies that have been entering the markets are trying niche or specialty birds and markets, and sometimes it’s harder for those companies that have higher costs when you have economic downturn,” she said.
Arkansas isn’t alone in terms of processing plant closures.
“I think the plant closures have been impactful this year,” Thompson said, citing restructuring within the poultry industry across the U.S.
Larger, well-established companies oversee most poultry production phases such as feeding, slaughtering and processing, which also makes it harder for a new integrator or a new company to enter the market because of the large-scale efficiencies already in place, she explained.
There isn’t much money to be made per individual bird, “which is why we go back to those small-scale producers and those new players in the market and why they may face financial challenges,” she said.
Filling the knowledge gaps for industry profitability
When asked of the biggest achievements of her research from this year, Thompson pointed to a study she conducted alongside James Mitchell, assistant professor of agricultural economics and agribusiness, and Trey Malone, formerly with the Division of Agriculture and now the Boehlje Endowed Chair for Managerial Economics in Agribusiness at Purdue University, investigating the impacts of generational bird losses due to HPAI.
“It takes chickens close to a month to hatch and five months to get to sexual maturity, which means if you have a layer that gets depopulated because of HPAI, it’s six months before you have another layer in her place,” she said of the work.
Looking toward the future, Thompson sees prices remaining fairly constant.
“I don’t see prices going down substantially. I think without some major external factor, I don’t think they’re going to go up either,” she said.
For HPAI concerns, commercial growers should contact their service technicians or flock managers. Backyard and hobby flock owners can contact their local veterinarian, county extension agent or call the Arkansas Department of Agriculture at 501-823-1746 or the USDA hotline at 866-536-7593.