The Hindu Business Line : <I>Managing disasters </I>

The poultry industry last week received yet another reminder of how, in spite of a surface normality in our everyday lives, we are never far from a calamity. If you were in the business of raising, selling or cooking chicken or eggs, financial ruin would have stared you in the face. Who would have imagined that in a matter of days a scare such as the Avian flu virus, which was almost baseless where most parts of India were concerned, would wipe out the livelihood of several hundred thousands?

Loss of livelihood

On the eastern side of Western Ghats, in Tamil Nadu alone, the poultry industry is reportedly growing at over four million birds in an average week and valued annually at around Rs 1,300 crore. As an immediate reaction to the reports of bird deaths, the government announced culling of birds only within a ten-kilometre radius of the affected areas in Maharashtra; yet the ripple effect of this crippled the trade in many states far away.

Many destroyed eggs before they could hatch because the losses would have been greater otherwise. The average price fell from Rs 41 to Rs 11 a kg of meat. Now comes the suggestion that there may well have been vested interests in the drug industry in America pushing the vaccine Tamiflu and wanting to drum up support for their case.

A cautious approach

According to presented facts and figures, the virus, if it has indeed spread, has been relatively innocuous compared to several other major causes of human fatalities worldwide. One estimate has it that the damage has been limited to some 90 deaths. Surely, this does not qualify the flu virus to be called an epidemic, in the same breath as malaria or AIDS? The lesson for the government is one of more mature and cautious approach to disaster management.

By allowing the scare to snowball the way it did, the livelihoods of thousands of traders and farmers have been wiped out.

Some say, the media played their role in killing the earnings of poultry farmers, traders, retailers, companies, vaccine manufactures, maize and soya growers.

Lessons for managers

There are lessons in this for managers in general too. When you have everyone losing their heads around you, it pays to keep your cool and look at the data carefully, and then plan the damage limitation exercises and disseminate information accurately, clearly and quickly.

In one case, a well-known club of Chennai immediately circularised all its members on the steps being taken and clearly showed that with proper care as to the cooking temperatures recommended and practised always, there was no question of any virus spreading to humans, quite apart from the fact that there was not even one case reported in this State.

In this instance, one industry senior manager has pointed out that as selling is not a national level activity, unlike packaged products, and it is predominantly rural and confined to regions, the business could easily be demarcated into four-five natural zones of contiguous producing and consuming States. This would avoid future damage even if any such scare does arise.

S. Ramachander

More Stories on : Management | Poultry | Health | Jottings

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