Doc 019 - Dead birds or shattered hopes?

A study of the impact of Bird Flu on poor people's poultry related livelihoods in West Bengal

In 2008, SA PPLPP presented Study report on- Poultry based livelihoods of rural poor: Case of Kuroiler in West Bengal - a state in India. Within three months of completion of survey in October 07, Bird flu broke out in January 08. SAPPLPP looked upon it as an opportunity to study the Impact of Bird Flu on Poor People’s Poultry related Livelihoods.

Uniqueness of the current study lies in the fact that it tracks a sub-set of the households included in 2007 study and examines the impact of the bird flu outbreak and associated control measures on income and nutritional aspects of households involved in the entire chain of Kuroiler distribution and production. A survey of Kuroiler rearing households (and desi poultry rearing household in control sample) and those engaged in the Kuroiler supply chain just before the outbreak served as the benchmark to allow a ‘before and after’ comparison. The report throws up a number of interesting findings.

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