Bird flu may have decimated poultry businesses across Asia, but rat dealers have never had it so good.

stuff.co.nz: "PHNOM PENH:

I've got a constant stream of customers," Van Vath, a rat butcher in the western Cambodian town of Battambang, told Wednesday's edition of Cambodge Soir.

With customers shying away from chicken for fear of catching the deadly flu virus that has killed millions of birds and at least 20 people, she has been selling more than 200 kg (440 lb) of rodent meat every morning – twice her normal turnover.

In far-flung corners of the jungle-clad and impoverished Southeast Asian nation, rat – fried, grilled or roasted with garlic and vegetables – is a highly prized delicacy, fetching around 40 cents a kilogram.

It is not the only ingredient to be found scuttling on the rural Cambodian menu.

Spiders, water beetles, crickets, snakes, frogs and ants are all choice treats, with local tradition saying they were first eaten by starving peasants during the Khmer Rouge genocide in the 1970s.

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