Snubbed by religion in India, slaughtered for marriage ceremonies in West Africa and chased out of barnyards everywhere, the humble chicken has finally crossed the road of respect, being heralded as a possible solution to global hunger and rural poverty in the 21st century.
As the world tries to prepare for a possible global grain shortage in the next century, many agriculture scientists believe chickens, ducks, geese and eggs could provide poor countries with big gains in food production, nutrition and rural incomes."It is a production system that can be afforded by even the poor and represents a significant part of the rural economy," said E.B. Sonaiya, an animal-science specialist from Nigeria's Obafemi Awolowo University, at this week's 20th World's Poultry Congress in New Delhi.
Thousands of scientists, government planners, breeders and farmers have gathered this week at the quadrennial Poultry Congress and Exhibition - considered by some the "Chicken Olympics" - to praise the humble bird and find ways to improve its contribution to world food production.
Requiring little in the way of land, labor or capital, the minimalist chicken was lauded for its resourcefulness and efficiency in converting cheap feed into important proteins.
Sonaiya said chickens are ideal for small-scale African farmers and can help entire communities reduce their need for slash-and-burn agriculture. Ducks bring the added benefits of weeding ponds and controlling barnyard insects. Geese, he added, make excellent laborers to clear grass and weeds in coffee, pineapple and banana plantations.
Since 1968, India's egg production has increased fivefold to 26 billion eggs a year, while its chicken population has more than doubled to 230 million. Through a vast network of hatcheries, breeding farms and farmer support units, the country's egg production has grown recently by 7 percent a year - more than triple the growth rate of India's human population.
China, meanwhile, has benefited from its own urban demand for poultry products, and the transfer of a large part of the industry from Japan.
Chickens now account for about 32 percent of Japan's meat market, up from 21 percent in the 1960s, but the country's land and feed are too expensive for local rearing - three times the cost in China. Having reached a peak of 745 million birds in 1987, Japan's flock is now down to about 600 million, while 40 percent of the country's chicken farmers have gone out of business.
Over the past decade, China's experience has been the reverse. Egg production reached nine million tons in 1994, double the 1985 output. One reason cited was the strict government policy in cities like Beijing to develop a rural egg-supply industry with training, veterinary and marketing systems.
Even Pakistan, where red meat dominates the plate, has witnessed a chicken boom, thanks largely to a doubling of beef and mutton prices in the past decade and a slight decline in poultry and egg prices.
However, some speakers criticized governments in developing countries for placing too much emphasis on commercial poultry operations rather than the back-yard chicken and duck businesses that dominate much of the rural economy in Asia, Africa and Latin America.
In South Africa, where malnutrition affects 42 percent of children under the age of 5, some 4,000 families have joined a community-based program to develop an egg industry to supplement the high-energy, low-protein staple of corn meal.
In Bangladesh, home to 130 million chickens and ducks, poultry has transformed the rural economy as well, a study by the Bangladesh Livestock Research Institute found.
One of the country's leading non-government organizations, Proshika, helped tens of thousands of landless peasants create such jobs for themselves. It formed small poultry-rearing co-ops that buy feed, veterinary services and chicks of a Canadian parent breed, and market their eggs and meat. Proshika says its group members can earn a net profit of $20 a month.
"Poultry can also provide an income-distribution role within the family," said Mohammed Nuru Miah, coordinator of Proshika's livestock development program. "The ownership is not limited to the head of the family, but it is often shared or held completely by the wife of the farmer and children."
Making poultry farming more productive, however, has not proven to be an easy task for many governments and development agencies.
In countries with poor veterinary and agriculture extension services, common diseases continue to be a farmer's worst nightmare, although Sonaiya from Nigeria said the rapid growth of private vaccine firms has greatly reduced the risk in much of Africa.
Many of Africa's poorest countries also lack foreign exchange to purchase the imported feeds and vaccines needed for large-scale poultry growth, and their efforts to develop domestic supplies have been hindered by the continent's economic decline, trade barriers and official corruption.
Scientists at the congress complained that aid donors and development agencies are reluctant to support poultry programs, preferring to invest in researching and developing basic food grains.
They suggested that development agencies could help build better marketing systems for poultry rearers, who in many countries rely on neighbors, roadside stalls and barbecue pits to sell their products.
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service.)