Have you seen this post on second-hand battery pages in Africa? Do you think an intervention focusing on this issue would be promising? If so, what kind of intervention? Should this be focused on the exporting or importing countries?
I would be curious to get your opinion on this, as we (Animal Advocacy Africa) are currently considering different strategies to recommend/​pursue.
Thanks for your questions, Moritz! I hadn’t seen that post.
I don’t think I could tell you with confidence that such interventions would be promising. There are a lot of steps in the causal chain that I’m unsure about.
Looking at the supplementary material of this study, it seems like a lot of the second-hand cages from the EU’s ban may have been sold to countries that already almost only use cage-free systems (cross-referencing with OWID data numbers ). So perhaps many of second-hand cages are simply replacing old ones, rather than causing more chickens to end up in them (of course they could be used for new chickens farms ― don’t know).
Note that the OWID numbers are more recent, so it’s possible some of these countries increased their cage share as a result of those sales.
Still, it’s possible that more are now being sold to e.g. Nigeria, and that this is placing new chickens in cages. So the question is: how much does the lower cost of second hand cages induce more adoption? I would think some bit, but I find it hard to say.
How concentrated is the supply of second-hand cages? Would bans in a few exporting countries/​companies restrict the supply a lot?
What systems are they transitioning from, and what are the improvements in benefits?
It also feels like this would maybe be more of delaying tactic, as producers may upgrade once they are wealthier or new cages are cheaper.
Also, from the spreadsheet you shared with me, it seems like a lot of the projected growth in chicken consumption is in Nigeria. The more the consumption growth is concentrated in one or a few countries, the more it may make sense to focus on their policies.
Sorry, I know this isn’t really an answer to your questions ― it’s hard to think about!
Have you seen this post on second-hand battery pages in Africa? Do you think an intervention focusing on this issue would be promising? If so, what kind of intervention? Should this be focused on the exporting or importing countries?
I would be curious to get your opinion on this, as we (Animal Advocacy Africa) are currently considering different strategies to recommend/​pursue.
Thank you!
Thanks for your questions, Moritz! I hadn’t seen that post.
I don’t think I could tell you with confidence that such interventions would be promising. There are a lot of steps in the causal chain that I’m unsure about.
Looking at the supplementary material of this study, it seems like a lot of the second-hand cages from the EU’s ban may have been sold to countries that already almost only use cage-free systems (cross-referencing with OWID data numbers ). So perhaps many of second-hand cages are simply replacing old ones, rather than causing more chickens to end up in them (of course they could be used for new chickens farms ― don’t know).
Note that the OWID numbers are more recent, so it’s possible some of these countries increased their cage share as a result of those sales.
Still, it’s possible that more are now being sold to e.g. Nigeria, and that this is placing new chickens in cages. So the question is: how much does the lower cost of second hand cages induce more adoption? I would think some bit, but I find it hard to say.
How concentrated is the supply of second-hand cages? Would bans in a few exporting countries/​companies restrict the supply a lot?
What systems are they transitioning from, and what are the improvements in benefits?
It also feels like this would maybe be more of delaying tactic, as producers may upgrade once they are wealthier or new cages are cheaper.
Also, from the spreadsheet you shared with me, it seems like a lot of the projected growth in chicken consumption is in Nigeria. The more the consumption growth is concentrated in one or a few countries, the more it may make sense to focus on their policies.
Sorry, I know this isn’t really an answer to your questions ― it’s hard to think about!
Thanks for your inputs, this is great. I also didn’t expect you to have the perfect answer. It’s a very tricky problem.
I’ll incorporate these considerations in our research!