The poultry supply chain and the case of H5N1 avian influenza outbreak in Turkey

Abstract

This thesis explores the poultry industry through an examination of its history, its inherent network of actors and institutions, its integrated processes, its joint exploitation of birds, human workers and the environment, and its role in the emergence and evolution of zoonotic avian influenza. To this end, it focuses firstly on the history of the birth of the industry in the US and its development in Turkey in relation to the global neoliberal restructuring of agriculture; secondly on the standard and routine practices and processes of the entire current poultry supply chain with a comparative analysis of industries in the US, Turkey and the EU; and thirdly, on the role of the industrial poultry corporations in the emergence of avian influenza and capital accumulation the industry gained from the 2003-2006 wave of H5N1 subtype with a particular investigation of the case of 2005-2006 outbreak in Turkey. It further concentrates on the larger link between the animal-industrial complex and agro-food capital with zoonotic diseases. It relies on the analysis of digital and printed archival data obtained from a range of sources from the industry, academia and activists in order to account for the extent, practices and impacts of the industry. By following the techniques and technologies deployed by the industry and the contradictions and resistances it continuously creates, the thesis aims to contribute to the fields of critical animal studies and political economy, and the discussions of animal liberation and total liberation of humans, nonhuman animals and nature from capital.|Keywords : Poultry, Human-animal relationships, Animal welfare, Human animal interaction, Industrial capitalism, Zoonotic diseases, industrial animal husbandry