{"id":3866,"date":"2015-05-15T12:01:17","date_gmt":"2015-05-15T16:01:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.andrewlawler.com\/?p=3866"},"modified":"2024-12-21T12:08:25","modified_gmt":"2024-12-21T17:08:25","slug":"a-world-without-chickens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.andrewlawler.com\/content\/a-world-without-chickens\/","title":{"rendered":"A world without chickens"},"content":{"rendered":"

We often take this\u00a0humble bird for granted,\u00a0but could humanity\u00a0survive without it?\u00a0Andrew Lawler\u00a0investigates.<\/h2>\n

\"a-world-without-chickens\"
\nIF THE world\u2019s cats and dogs disappeared overnight, millions of people would mourn their furry friends. If beef cattle suddenly ceased to exist, it would create economic crises in America, Argentina and Australia. But what if all of Earth\u2019s 22 billion chickens succumbed to a scourge like bird flu? How would humanity cope?<\/p>\n

\"furry-footed-chicken\"It\u2019s a thought experiment whose answers show just how much human civilisation has come to rely on a single species. Without chickens, we would face \u201ca starving world\u201d, says Olivier Hanotte, a molecular biologist at the University of Nottingham, UK, who has studied the spread of the chicken around the globe. Close to one-third of the world\u2019s meat supply and nearly all of its eggs would vanish. Pandemics and riots could ensue, unleashing a crisis of enormous proportions. This might seem far-fetched given how unremarkable the bird appears. But as a ubiquitous food source and more, it has pecked and scratched its way into almost every corner of human existence.<\/p>\n

The story of the chicken-human bond is an ancient one. Some 3000 years ago, Polynesians took chickens with them on their expeditions to settle Pacific islands, using their bones to make sewing needles, tattooing implements and even musical instruments. Ancient Greeks considered the bird sacred to their god of healing, and believed its parts could cure illnesses ranging from burns to bedwetting. Roman generals kept a flock of chickens on hand before battles for military advice. If the sacred birds ate heartily before the conflict began, then the generals could expect victory; if they turned up their beaks, then best to retreat. And cockfighting is probably the oldest spectator sport after boxing.<\/p>\n

Today, of course, the chicken is chiefly a source of food. In that role, it has become staggeringly abundant, outnumbering all the pigs and cows on the planet combined. Add in dogs and cats, and there would still be more
\nchickens. For every person, three chickens are alive and clucking today. Humans gobble down almost 100 million tonnes of chicken meat and over 1 trillion eggs annually. On a single day this year, Super Bowl Sunday, Americans ate an estimated 1.25 billion chicken wings.<\/p>\n

More than\u00a022 billion\u00a0chickens\u00a0live on the\u00a0planet \u2013 three\u00a0for every\u00a0human<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Yet this popularity is surprisingly new. As recently as 1950, Americans ate twice as much red meat as chicken. Today that situation is reversed. The chicken\u2019s rise began after the second world war, when US poultry breeders<\/p>\n

developed a bird for mass production that grew bigger breast muscles, required less feed, took far less time to mature, and produced tender meat that could be carved almost like a steak.<\/p>\n

This highly engineered animal now powers huge poultry industries throughout the world. Though people in Asia still eat fewer chickens than North Americans, they are catching up: chicken is poised to surpass pork \u2013 the traditional Chinese favourite \u2013 as the world\u2019s most popular meat by 2020.<\/p>\n

What would we do without it? Recent events suggest we could be in big trouble. Mexicans eat more eggs than anyone else \u2013 about 330 each year, on average \u2013 and when egg prices shot up in Mexico City in 2012 following the culling of millions of sick birds, demonstrators took to the streets in what was dubbed \u201cThe Great Egg Crisis\u201d. During the 2011 uprising in Egypt, angry protesters rallied to the cry: \u201cThey are eating pigeons and chicken, but we eat beans every day!\u201d When poultry prices tripled in Iran recently, the nation\u2019s police chief warned television producers not to broadcast images of people eating chicken to avoid inciting violence. Across the Persian Gulf in Saudi Arabia, chicken feed is subsidised to keep meat prices low and a potentially restive population quiet.<\/p>\n

Why has the chicken \u2013 rather than, say, the duck or yak \u2013 emerged as the single most important animal species for humanity? The answer lies partially in its remarkable adaptability.<\/p>\n

Charles Darwin, who spent a good deal of time and money studying the bird, was one of the first to realise this. He collected chickens from all over the world, many of which he bequeathed to the Natural History Museum in London. Some are skins that were prepared using a particular technique. \u201cYou remove their innards, pop out the brains and eyes, and sew them back up,\u201d curator Joanne Cooper explains cheerfully when I visited the collection.<\/p>\n

Through typically patient study, Darwin deduced that all varieties of domestic chicken descended from the red jungle fowl, a shy and elusive pheasant that lives across south Asia and parts of China, and is adapted to a variety of habitats. His conclusions were confirmed in 2004, when the bird\u2019s genome was sequenced.<\/p>\n

The red jungle fowl, which was domesticated at least 4000 years ago, bequeathed the chicken a genome forged by a wide range of environments, from Himalayan foothills to Sumatran jungles. Along the way, the domestic chicken may have also picked up genes from other jungle fowl subspecies, including the Indian grey jungle fowl. \u201cWhat is remarkable about the chicken is its genetic diversity,\u201d says Hanotte. \u201cIt\u2019s probably the most genetically diverse species of livestock, with the possible exception of pigs.\u201d This has not only helped the village chicken thrive on every continent except Antarctica, but has also allowed humans to breed what American ornithologist William Beebe called \u201cbeautiful, bizarre, or monstrous races\u201d of chickens, from fluffy silkies to leggy langshans.<\/p>\n

\"land-grab\"<\/a>The rise of the chicken is not necessarily a bad thing, in fact, the bird is something of an environmental hero. To understand its impressive efficiency, let\u2019s imagine the impact of replacing chicken with meat from other livestock animals.<\/p>\n

Beef, which makes up about a quarter of the meat eaten in the US, would be the most disastrous replacement. Kilogram for kilogram, we would have to find over 1000 per cent more land for beef than is used to produce chicken, an area larger than China and India combined.<\/p>\n

Cows convert food into meat far less efficiently than chickens,\u00a0so even if we turned entirely to\u00a0intensively raised grain-fed cattle\u00a0we\u2019d need to provide them with\u00a0eight times as much feed to get\u00a0the same amount of meat. Given
\nthat growing food for livestock\u00a0already takes up around a third of the arable\u00a0land on Earth, there might not be room.<\/p>\n

What about pigs? We would need to at\u00a0least double the number from 1 to more than\u00a02 billion to take care of the meat shortfall, and\u00a0more of the planet would need to become\u00a0farmland since pigs require almost 14 per cent
\nmore feed than chickens to produce a\u00a0kilogram of meat.<\/p>\n

If we\u2019re talking about the environment,\u00a0there\u2019s also the matter of gas. Unlike chickens,\u00a0cows and sheep ferment their meals in a\u00a0bacteria-rich stomach called the rumen,\u00a0producing large amounts of the potent\u00a0greenhouse gas methane in the process.\u00a0Beef is responsible for almost four times the\u00a0amount of greenhouse gas (including carbon\u00a0dioxide) per kilogram of meat as chicken,\u00a0while lamb produces over five times as much.\u00a0Switching to cheese as a source of protein\u00a0would almost double greenhouse gas\u00a0emissions, while turning to pork would\u00a0increase them by 75 per cent. Satisfying the\u00a0world\u2019s insatiable demand for meat without\u00a0chickens would slam down the gas pedal on\u00a0global warming.<\/p>\n

What about other birds? Ducks and turkeys\u00a0might seem like sensible replacements, but\u00a0they have several drawbacks. You can\u2019t put\u00a0turkeys and geese into small enclosures, and\u00a0ducks need water. \u201cYou don\u2019t find ducks in
\nsemi-desert subsisting on vermin,\u201d says\u00a0Hanotte. \u201cDucks are adaptable, but they\u2019re not\u00a0as adaptable as chickens.\u201d Turkeys are not as\u00a0efficient egg producers, and neither species\u00a0produces as much meat as chickens do on the
\nsame feed. \u201cDucks and turkeys have their\u00a0niche, but they are not going to be\u00a0competitors,\u201d says Hanotte. He thinks that,\u00a0in terms of protein, insects rather than ducks\u00a0would be the most likely replacement.<\/p>\n

Avian lifesavers<\/h3>\n

The nascent insect protein market might well\u00a0expand, but in the meantime demand for\u00a0seafood would surge, potentially pushing\u00a0many of the world\u2019s fisheries \u2013 which\u00a0currently produce some 80 million tones\u00a0per year \u2013 to collapse. Aquaculture would\u00a0ramp up, but it would take time to increase\u00a0production (now about 60 million tones a\u00a0year) to make up for all that chicken.<\/p>\n

Some countries might be able to keep their\u00a0populations in meat \u2013 the US, for example,\u00a0could halt all beef and pork exports and return\u00a0to something resembling its pre-1950 meat eating\u00a0habits. And for those Westerners willing\u00a0to explore plant-based meat substitutes,\u00a0foods such as textured wheat protein (already\u00a0used in \u201cchicken-less nuggets\u201d) would likely\u00a0become more widespread. Such a switch could\u00a0make a difference to the environment: if we all\u00a0swapped chicken for beans, for example,\u00a0greenhouse gas emissions would be much\u00a0lower. Chicken is responsible for 6.9 kg of\u00a0greenhouse gases per kg of meat, compared\u00a0with 2 kg for bean protein (see diagram, left).<\/p>\n

Other places might not fare so well. In parts\u00a0of Africa and Asia, where chicken is common\u00a0street food and even the poorest can keep a\u00a0fowl or two in their backyard, the bird\u2019s demise\u00a0would lead to skyrocketing malnutrition rates.\u00a0Chicken meat and eggs are particularly rich in\u00a0the essential amino acids lysine and\u00a0threonine, which our bodies cannot\u00a0manufacture. \u201cIt is impossible for the world to\u00a0exist as it does today without the animal\u00a0protein via chicken eggs and meat,\u201d says\u00a0Jianlin Han, a biologist at Beijing\u2019s Institute of\u00a0Animal Science in China.<\/p>\n

\"vaccine-grown-in-eggs\"<\/a>So much for nutrition. The chicken plays\u00a0another, more hidden role in society: its eggs\u00a0are crucial for making flu vaccine. To produce\u00a0the world\u2019s 400 million annual doses, cultured\u00a0flu strains are injected into fertilised eggs,\u00a0a nutrient-rich and otherwise sterile\u00a0environment in which the virus quickly\u00a0multiplies. The virus-laden fluid is harvested,\u00a0and the virus killed or weakened, with one\u00a0egg equalling approximately one vaccine.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just amazing how well influenza\u00a0virus grows in eggs,\u201d says Doris Bucher, a\u00a0microbiologist whose lab at New York Medical\u00a0College is one of just three in the world that\u00a0grow flu strains for the annual vaccine.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the cheapest way to produce it.\u201d\u00a0The US in particular has funded a hunt for\u00a0alternatives to the egg-based vaccine, in part\u00a0because of fears over what might happen if\u00a0chickens disappeared. \u201cThere was a concern\u00a0that if you had H5N1, that it could wipe out\u00a0every chicken on the planet,\u201d says Bucher.<\/p>\n

Swiss pharmaceutical company Novartis\u00a0has developed an alternative called Flucelvax\u00a0grown in the kidney cell line of a cocker\u00a0spaniel, which was approved in Europe in\u00a02007 (under the name Optaflu), and in the US\u00a0in 2012. The drug is only approved for people\u00a0aged 18 and older, however, and it would take\u00a0time to scale up to meet worldwide demand.\u00a0\u201cThings could change, but we\u2019re certainly not\u00a0there yet,\u201d says Bucher.<\/p>\n

If the chicken were to disappear, one flu\u00a0season could kill 50,000 people in the US\u00a0alone, Bucher estimates. And if a new swine\u00a0flu or similar pandemic broke out, humanity\u00a0would have little defence against its ravages.<\/p>\n

Adieu, souffle<\/h3>\n

Of course, amid the riots and malnutrition\u00a0and illness, our sweet tooth would suffer too.\u00a0The disappearance of eggs would change\u00a0pastry as we know it, says Ludwig Hely,\u00a0executive pastry chef at The Savoy hotel in\u00a0London. \u201cIt would be terrible. It is by far the\u00a0hardest ingredient to replace,\u201d he says. \u201cFlour\u00a0is easy, but if we didn\u2019t have eggs, we would\u00a0lose the structure and lightness.\u201d Eggs from\u00a0ducks or even quails might provide a\u00a0substitute, but their relative rarity would\u00a0make pastry an expensive treat. Meanwhile,\u00a0egg replacements would become more\u00a0common, with ingredients like silken tofu,\u00a0baking powder and flaxseed meal being used\u00a0to bind and leaven dough. Such ingenuity will\u00a0be familiar to those who experienced\u00a0rationing during the second world war. Some\u00a0are already working on a modern-day version\u00a0of this resourcefulness: Jason Sellers, head\u00a0chef at Plant, one of the US\u2019s top vegan\u00a0restaurants, says that he has figured out how\u00a0to make an eggless meringue. Yet even he\u00a0admits that sometimes eggs are impossible to\u00a0replace. \u201cThere are some things that you just\u00a0can\u2019t do without eggs, such as souffle,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

The consequences of a chicken exodus\u00a0would not be all bad. Fewer people would\u00a0contract salmonella. The bacterium, which is\u00a0most often found on raw chicken, kills about\u00a0115,000 people worldwide every year, and\u00a0sickens tens of millions.<\/p>\n

Anyone concerned about animal welfare\u00a0would surely cheer the fact that billions of\u00a0chickens, which under the laws of most\u00a0governments have no protection and lead\u00a0short and brutal lives, would finally be freed\u00a0from servitude, even at the cost of extinction.\u00a0Anthropologist Steve Striffler, whose book\u00a0Chicken explores the history of the bird\u2019s\u00a0industrialisation, says that while the chicken is\u00a0a crucial source of protein to the world\u2019s rural\u00a0poor, its disappearance in developed\u00a0economies might not be a bad thing. \u201cAbout 75\u00a0per cent of chickens are produced industrially\u00a0in the First World,\u201d he says. \u201cThey are raised\u00a0under extremely bad circumstances and\u00a0essentially have no lives. And all this for food\u00a0that is often produced in ways that are bad for\u00a0workers, consumers, and the environment.\u201d<\/p>\n

How likely is Chicken Armageddon?\u00a0The bird is increasingly concentrated by the\u00a0million in enormous farms, and therefore is\u00a0more susceptible to the spread of disease than\u00a0most village birds. Avian flu a decade ago\u00a0resulted in the culling of over 100 million\u00a0birds across Asia, and has reared its head again\u00a0this year. Yet the chicken is nothing if not a\u00a0survivor. It has spent the last several thousand\u00a0years alongside humans. And every year,\u00a0it becomes more inexorably bound up with\u00a0our well-being. The sky might not fall, but\u00a0a chicken-less planet would be nothing to crow about.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We often take this\u00a0humble bird for granted,\u00a0but could humanity\u00a0survive without […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3866","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nA world without chickens • Andrew Lawler<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"We often take this\u00a0humble bird for granted,\u00a0but could humanity\u00a0survive without it?\u00a0Andrew Lawler\u00a0investigates. 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