ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – The lead-up to Eid al-Adha - the Eid of Sacrifice - is normally peak business time for livestock sellers in Erbil, but coronavirus-fuelled economic woe has put a dampener on sales.

Weeks of lockdown measures by the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) to curb spread of the virus left many without a source of income.

"The sale of our livestock for sacrifice during Eid al-Adha has halved from last year's levels due to the economic crisis," a trader at the Erbil Livestock Market told Rudaw.

Even cut livestock prices have failure to lure in customers, Saeed said.

"Unfortunately, our market has dropped. It is very weak these days," he said. "In previous years, we couldn't keep up with the number of customers we had - we didn't even have time to respond to phone calls from customers. But you can see how empty the market is," he said.

The import of animals from outside the Kurdistan Region have dealt a further blow to business, Saeed said. 

Where the price of Kurdish ox meat stood at 8,000 dinars in 2019, it now stands at 6,000, according to Saeed.

Eight kinds of livestock are available for sale at the public market, including rams, ewes, goats, baby goats, oxen, lambs, cows, calves and camels.  

As part of government-ordered coronavirus containment measures, the 5,000-animal capacity market is only open on Saturdays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays. 

Photos by Bilind T. Abdullah / Rudaw