Christian adoption scheme exposes fowl trade rules
-08/04/05
Christian Aid is launching an adopt-a-chicken scheme with the help of top UK comedians to highlight the scandal of foul trade rules.
The international development charity will introduce a new website on 13 April, during the Global Week of Action (10-16 April) which will enable visitors to choose from an interactive catalogue of animated poultry with short biographies and even hear a personal message from their chosen chicken.
Cheap frozen chickens from Europe are flooding the Ghanaian meat market. Local farmers are unable to compete and are being forced out of business. As a result, many Ghanaian chickens have been made ëredundantí.
Christian Aid has developed an alternative ëadoption schemeí over the web that connects sympathetic humans with their perfect chicken match.
The online adoption process takes you through six chicken-proof steps:
1. Get an overview from Helen Baxendale of Friends and Cold Feet, who introduces the adoption scheme.
2. Select a chicken from an interactive catalogue of animated poultry, which includes a short biography and in-depth psychometric data. Each chicken is given a celebrity endorsement on video from UK comedians including Andrew Clover, Al McKenzie, Nick Rowe, Susan Vidler, Alex Horne, Lucy Montgomery and Emma Pearson.
3. Sign-up for the adoption scheme, get a live video feed of your chicken and hear their personal message.
4. Witness the brutal killing of your newly adopted chicken and weep until you find out that it was a spoof.
5. Read the real-life story of Mrs Yumbia, a Ghanaian chicken farmer, to find out “what the cluck this trade justice is all about” as Christian Aid puts it. Mrs Yumbia was forced out of business because she couldnít compete with cheap imported chicken from the EU and the US, and her government wasnít allowed to help its farmers with subsidies or protect their own chicken market with higher tariffs on imports.
6. Add your vote for trade justice online to press Prime Minister Tony Blair to change trade rules that put poor countries at a disadvantage.
Vik Sharma, Christian Aidís senior web producer, said; “MailOrderChickens is what happens to a website when you blend harsh political realities, frankly weird farmyard critters and the mischief of Britainís finest young comedy talent. Itís an experience that has to be seen to be believed. In fact, I HAVE seen it and I still donít believe it.”
With the Global Week of Action set to mobilise an estimated ten million people around the world to speak out against the unjust trade agreements forced on poor countries, Christian Aid wants to encourage visitors to the site to add their vote for trade justice.
So far, more than 140,000 votes have been cast for the Trade Justice Movement, 40 per cent of which were collected through Christian Aid. The Trade Justice Movement is a coalition of more than 60 organisations that aims to get one million votes for fairer trade rules by the end of the year.