News

Scientists from the Institute of Molecular Genetics of the Czech Academy of Sciences have bred a genetically modified chicken that is immune to the avian retrovirus known as ALV-J, which causes tumours and immunosuppression in infected chickens.

Jiří Hejnar, one of the geneticists from the institute, told Czech Radio that the new discovery could help strengthen resistance to the virus particularly in Asian farms and that the concept the scientists used could also be applied to other viral infections such as bird flu.

How to specifically implement the method in practice is still being discussed.

Around 50,000 trees in the South Bohemian forest of Šumava have been damaged as a result of the strong winds that swept through the Czech Republic on Monday and Tuesday. The exact extent of damages is still being estimated by foresters, but it seems that the strong winds did not cause heavy damage in any specific part of the park, Blanka Müllerová from the Šumava National Park told the Czech News Agency on Wednesday.

The Czech Republic saw winds at the speed of up to 180 kilometres per hour in places as the wind storm known as “Sabine” passed through the country. However, according to Pavel Šimandl from the Czech Hydrometeorological Institute, the winds were not strong enough to be classified as a hurricane force.

The Czech government and the semi-state power giant CEZ will publish a deal on the construction of a new unit at the Dukovany nuclear power station in the coming weeks, the minister of industry and trade, Karel Havlíček, said on Tuesday. Mr. Havlíček said a supplier of the new unit should be selected by the end of this year. Planning permission ought to be issued by 2029 and construction on the new nuclear unit would begin soon after, he told reporters on a visit to Dukovany.

The head of CEZ, Daniel Beneš, said recently that the state would hold consultations during February with five companies seeking a contract to build the unit. These include Russia’s Rosatom and Westinghouse from the US.

The Social Democrats plan to raise the issue of VAT rates on beer with coalition partners ANO, the former’s MP Václav Votava said on Tuesday. The junior government party voted recently for a change in VAT on draught beer without thinking the matter through, Mr. Votava said.

The ANO-controlled Ministry of Finance has put forward a new system under which there would be different VAT rates on beer depending on where it was sold, with a lower rate in place at restaurants where the drink is consumed on the premises. The change, which has come in for a lot of online mockery, should take effect from May.