I was in Accompong Town during this shortage and, although we don't eat meat at my home, my neighbors raise a lot of chickens for eggs and for meat both "free range" and in a coop.
This shortage was caused by several factors. Feed got too expensive to raise chickens for meat so the production went down and they just let them roam for food and roost for the egg production. Next, the eggs were in very short supply and you couldn't find them in the stores in Santa Cruz. Also, those who bought chickens to raise had to put up a large deposit as much as 6 months in advance of delivery or getting the chickens wouldn't be guaranteed. Most Jamaican farmers don't have the ready cash to do that so when they became available for sale, the people who did pay the deposits got most of all the available chickens. Tourism goes up dramatically and the demand for the tourist market severely impacted the availability for local street and store vendors to the point that they could only by one bag of chicken parts at a time. Many small cook shops had to close their doors because they had no chicken to sell.
All these occurring at the same time dried up the supply and the prices too. At $120.00+ Jamaican to a US $, the $200 - $400J box lunches could not pay for the increased price causing more problems.
This is a problem that will most likely occur every year during tourist season now until production can ramp up at an affordable price to supply both the tourist and local market.
Peace and Guidance
