THE SHORTAGE OF CHICKEN

Jul 06, 2010 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

Chicken is in short supply again and as expected prices are rising for this most important part of the diet of most Guyanese.
Chicken and fish are the most essential sources of protein in Guyana but chicken outstrips fish as the most consumed source of protein in the country.
For the vast majority of Guyanese chicken is the main protein within their diets. Many do not eat pork and beef for religious and other reasons.
Duck and mutton are expensive and outside the reach of the average family. Fish is seasonal and the price for snapper and trout is often just as high as meat protein.
The availability of chicken is therefore critical to the nutritional needs of the population. Yet hardly a year goes by without some disruption in the supply of protein in the country.
Once again consumers, particularly those who prefer to purchase live chicken, are having problems obtaining this meat. Some people buy frozen meat. Others cannot do so for reasons of taste and convenience. Some persons do not like to eat meat that is frozen.
They believe that fresh meat is tastier and therefore they would opt to buy live chicken birds, and have these plucked and then cooked. Thousands of poor people do not have refrigerators and thus are forced to buy their chicken fresh.
Right now, live birds are in short supply. The problem is most acute in the countryside where many farmers simply do not have meat birds for sale at this time. This is posing real hardships especially for poor households and those that operate on shoestring budgets.
With these shortages comes an increase in price. Chicken prices are already high and hardly ever are restored after a prolonged shortage. It is therefore now certain that chicken prices will not return to their former level unless chicken is imported.
The importation of chicken is not going to alleviate the present shortage. It will take at least six weeks for imported chicken to arrive even if orders are placed now.
The importation of chicken will therefore not solve the present problem. What it will do is ensure that when local production is restored- and there is a shortage of production right now, particularly in the rural areas- that prices are stabilized.
Thus even if private importers do not take up the offer of import licenses to import chicken, the government through the New Guyana Marketing Corporation should import a boatload of chicken from Brazil or Venezuela so as to ensure that there is a glut within the next sex weeks when local production is expected to be restored to normalcy.
If when local production is restored prices reach above or even close to three hundred dollars, it will pose real hardships for poor people.
Already there are hardships because of the shortage of chicken on the local market and it is disappointing that this situation was allowed to develop given the history of the movement of chicken prices and shortages in the local economy over the years.
It is disappointing that the present problem could not have been avoided by effective surveillance by the Ministry of Trade.
The government should assess if anything went wrong with the monitoring system within that ministry because there ought never to have been a problem with the supply of hatching eggs which we are being told is responsible for the present shortages.
While that systems review is taking place- if it is ever commissioned- consumers will have to face the burden of either paying higher prices or doing without chicken. We are told that it may take four to six weeks for production to get back to normal.
Consumers, however, do not have to wait four to six weeks and to hope then that prices also return to normal. It may not but there is a sure way for consumers to ensure this happens.
If all chicken lovers make the sacrifice not to eat chicken for one week, then you can be certain that the shortage will disappear in less than four weeks.
All it will take is a one week of a no-chicken diet for all those who use chicken.
This is not a call for boycott. It is a call for a sacrifice so as to ensure that prices are reduced when supplies return and it is also a means of ensuring a earlier than predicted restoration of normalcy.
Consumers have to accept that they have the most effective power available: the power to withdraw their patronage whenever there are shortages or price increase. But it does involve making personal sacrifices which in this instance would only demand going on a non- chicken diet for one week so that for weeks, months and years ahead, a shortage or increase in prices will not occur.
So what say you Guyanese chicken eaters? Are you all willing to make the sacrifice of not eating the meat birds for one week? Is this too much to ask?