Ghana makes you ask a lot of questions of the universe. One of the recent ones is, Why are chickens and goats running around everywhere, untended, in the middle of a city of 3 million people? At first I thought they were accidentally lost or abandoned, but there were far too many for that explanation, and besides - these are productive assets, unlikely to be misplaced. A goat can provide milk and meat; a chicken, eggs and a decent alarm clock. So why no chicken coops or goat pens?
It hit me - they're let out all day to forage for food. I guess the farmer's logic is, why buy feed yourself, when you could let nature re-distribute its resources equitably through a peck here and a graze there?
Of course, this system requires no small amount of community trust...I wouldn't let my animals out, even for free food, if I thought they were unlikely to come back to me at the end of the day. I can only do so if I trust that you - and everyone else within munching distance - will leave them alone. And here, that seems to be exactly the case.
I think a few economists out there might call this sort of community ethics "irrational," in that people are avoiding their own self-interest by NOT stealing these wandering animals for themselves. As the logic might go: not everyone is a chicken or goat farmer...if they were, then the incentive to steal would be decreased in order to avoid tit-for-tat...but since everyone does EAT, and goats and chickens are pretty good at meeting that need, the theft incentive seems to be pretty high. Basically, it would seem to be in the interest of a whole lot of individual poor folks to steal a chick every now and then that darted across the yard. In a way, the proof that theft doesn't really happen lies in the abundance of the opportunities to would-be thieves.
So, why does this phenomenon exist? (Discuss.)
PG
Monday, April 26, 2010
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Gosh. I don't know. I like to think that the incentive to steal chickens would be directly proportional to the general weight of the chicken in question. Maybe everyone's collectively waiting for the chickens to get fat enough to steal, and the desire to get the fattest chicken prohibits wanton thievery. It's like a giant game of—damn it. Chicken.
ReplyDeleteNicely played, sir. A little continental-ist of you, I think, but forgiveable. Chickens running around in the US, I guess, are relatively easy to steal because a) they don't know how to walk thanks to the coop, and b) their genetically- modified, "Xena, Warrior Princess"-sized breasts and thighs...
ReplyDeleteKarma's a bitch, man. No telling what will happen to you if you steal somebody's food without really needing it.
ReplyDeleteOr, they haven't begun importing chicken wire into Africa. Might be a business opportunity for you guys. You could even mandate it for insurance. Call it Operation Eggsurance.
In India the cows run the streets as well. And also eat trash off the street. Though not eaten, their milk production is obviously valued. They belong to individuals. I asked once what happens when/if they get stolen or hit by a car. Answer: "well, then there's goin to be a fight"... Course it's harder to steal a cow than a chicken...
ReplyDeleteum, let's see: threat of mutual mass destruction, re: if someone steals my chicken I might steal their goat (which could be considered worse, since a goat gives milk and can provide meat)?.
ReplyDeleteoddly, this goat-running-wild thing reminds me of oviedo (yeah the town in florida where jess and i lived, not the cool town in spain). anyway, chickens are allowed by law to run wild in oviedo. in fact, it's illegal to mess with them. this is all the more strange, since, as you know oviedo is now a suburb of orlando, international city of entertainment and all that; not exactly a locale you'd expect or hope to meet a rooster head-on going down the road. but, the rationale for the phenom is historical in nature: back in the depression era, chickens were let loose to forage and since their survival then was linked to the survival of the people, they are a protected class, shall we say, now. the symbol of chickens wandering free is apparently a weighty one to local, no doubt. be that as it may, to an outsider, it is damned irritating to have to slam on your brakes to avoid hitting a chicken crossing the road (insert joke here).
on a larger scale this chicken thing reminds me of growing up on lopez island, wa: we never locked our cars or homes and if mom had to run into the (one) grocery store and left us kids in the car, no one thought it strange and certainly no one thought of stealing us or the car; why would they? two more kids meant more mouths to feed! you get the point... :0)