On the application of CRAVED to livestock theft in Malawi

Abstract

Livestock theft is common in many parts of sub-Saharan Africa. Experience of theft can deplete household assets and food resources. This article reports the findings of an exploratory study to investigate whether livestock theft patterns in Malawi reflect variations in the extent to which different animals are “CRAVED” (Concealable, Removable, Available, Valuable, Enjoyable, and Disposable), Clarke's mnemonic to explain preferences for items to steal. Measures of the elements of CRAVED were correlated with self-reported levels of theft for seven species of livestock using data from a cross-sectional, nationally representative survey of 11,280 households. Higher availability and disposability of livestock were significantly associated with higher levels of theft. Livestock displaying more CRAVED attributes were also stolen in greater numbers. The findings are cautiously interpreted as suggesting that livestock theft in Malawi is largely opportunistic. Implications from and for the application of CRAVED to livestock theft in Malawi are discussed.

Keywords:

• agricultural crime
• CRAVED
• environmental criminology
• livestock theft
• Malawi

Acknowledgments

Thanks go to Kate Bowers, Paul Ekblom, Liz Stones, Nick Tilley and three anonymous reviewers for commenting on earlier drafts of this article.

Notes

1. Donnermeyer, Barclay, and Mears (2011) refer to these offences as “ordinary crimes”: those crime types that have long been the scourge of farmers and the farming industry. This is contrasted with what they call “extraordinary crimes,” which captures farm-related crime types that have come to prominence only in recent years, such as the cultivation of drugs at agricultural operations.

2. Mears et al. (2007) find that farms whose primary products are fruits and nuts experienced higher levels of crime than livestock-oriented farms. They interpret this finding as suggesting that fruits and nuts are easier to steal than livestock and therefore were more attractive theft targets. This is in line with the research reported here, however, the study authors do not examine whether variations within different types of fruits, nuts, livestock etc, account for the variation in the theft levels of fruits, nuts, and livestock, respectively.

3. In comparison, over the same year agriculture accounted for 1% of the GDP in the United Kingdom and the United States.

4. To expand, the death of a household member could have direct and indirect costs for the affected household. Direct costs relate to funeral expenses. Indirect costs include the loss in labor associated with the deceased individual and the subsequent impact on household income.

5. Botswana, Egypt, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Tunisia, Uganda, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.

6. Low reporting rates are not limited to sub-Saharan Africa. Donnermeyer and Barclay (2005), using data from New South Wales, Australia, report that 49% of sampled farms notified the police about being the victim of crime (not just livestock theft). This is attributed to a lack of proof as to what was actually stolen and to uncertainty as to whether a crime had taken place as opposed to, say, an animal dying from predation or natural causes.

7. There are officially 27 administrative districts in Malawi. However, Likoma District in Lake Malawi is excluded from the IHS II sampling frame because of the difficulties associated with traveling and surveying there.

8. Fieldwork for the Malawi IHS III was carried out in 2010–2011. The data are scheduled to be published in 2012.

9. Three additional IHS II questions relating to livestock ownership could have been included in the availability measure. These are (1) How many [type of animal] did your household purchase during the last 12 months?, (2) How many [type of animal] were born during the last 12 months?, and (3) How many [type of animal] were received as gifts by your household during the last 12 months? These questions share a common theme: they are concerned with livestock acquisitions in the previous year. They were not included in the availability measure so as to avoid double counting. Presumably, acquired livestock would already be included in the question concerning current livestock ownership. Alternatively, if acquired livestock had been consumed, sold, or stolen prior to the time of survey, then these too would already be accounted for in the availability, disposability, and theft measures, respectively.

10. The reader should note that the definition of domestic burglary used herein is broader than the definition of domestic burglary used in many victim surveys. We can be reasonably confident, however, that such questions relate to burglary offences, since respondents’ experience of personal crime is probed in additional IHS II questions.