After so long that I can’t count the months, perhaps 8, we have chicken again. Most of the chicken in Bhutan is imported from India. That includes the day old chicks that are grown for laying eggs. As soon as there were confirmed cases of bird flu in India, Marie’s department closed the border for imports. It only took a couple of weeks for chicken and eggs to disappear from the shelves. What little was being produced within Bhutan was going to the royal palace.
Eggs reappeared a month or so later and I assume that the king, in his usual humble way, decided that he shouldn’t be depriving his people. But the price jumped from 6 Nu to 15 Nu per egg and you had to fight for them.
Then a few months ago, some of Marie’s managers went to India to negotiate new a new import agreement. Now there are strict controls on where the chickens may come from and under what conditions. The egg situation will take time to change, but now we get supermarket style chicken in the shops rather than having to gut it ourselves. And I had chicken curry with my lunch yesterday. Yum!