By Saturday, 23 provincial regions across China have held meetings on prevention and control of bird flu epidemics, and launched all-around mobilization, Ministry of Agriculture said Sunday.

Many provinces have established quick-response mechanisms on major animal-related epidemics, and set up the 24-hour on-watch systems, the ministry said.

These provinces, municipalities, and autonomous regions all increase their fund and material investment so as to guarantee the demand of epidemic prevention and control work. Inner Mongolia, Jilin, Hunan, Hubei, Chongqing, Yunnan, Shaanxi, Ningxia and Xinjiang allocated special fund for the prevention work of bird flu.

These provinces have raised fund to buy and reserve bacterins, disinfection products, equipment and exposure suits.

North China's Shanxi Province injected bacterins to poultry raised by farmers free of charge, while east China's Zhejiang Province appointed one epidemic reporter in each village.

Beijing Municipality enhanced the inspection and quarantine work on poultry products transported from other parts of China by railway, air and road. East China's Jiangsu Province sent inspectors to markets and set up temporary disinfection stations on road intersections.

Local agricultural and sanitation departments have enhanced their cooperation and established information-exchange mechanism to jointly prevent the bird flu epidemic, the ministry said.

(Xinhua News Agency November 14, 2005)