And somehow, the rest of the world has
no idea this is happening.
During a period of approximately 72 hours, approximately 50
million animals are sacrificed annually on Eid al-Adha, by Muslims worldwide.
The economic activity from this single religious event tops $100 billion. If
you are not a Muslim, the odds are very high that you don't know about any of
this.
It is one of the largest economic events on the planet,
involving almost two billion participants, and barely mentioned in the global
financial media. That's not a reporting problem. It's a lack of education, a
collective ignorance of more than a quarter of mankind. The price we pay for
this ignorance is incalculable in terms of world peace, economic sense and
human unity.
What It Actually Is
The celebration of Eid al-Adha is actually the time that God
tested the Prophet Ibrahim with the order to sacrifice his beloved possession,
which in the end was the sacrifice of a ram, which substituted his son. Today
Muslims sacrifice animals as a re-enactment of that time, known as Qurbani. It
is a matter of faith, submission and generosity.
The rules are specific; It must be a healthy animal. There are
three parts to the meat: a share for the family, a share for relatives and
friends, and a share for those who can't afford food. The last part is not an
added option, it is the purpose of it. Eid al-Adha is essentially a large
built-in food redistribution system, on a scale not matched by any government
programme. It is a theology of peace in action — a planned, annual
redistribution of resources from the ‘have' to the ‘have not'.
A book listing the numbers nobody is talking about."$100
billion, 50 million animals, 72 hours a year.
Just in Pakistan alone, 6.8 million animals were sacrificed in
2024, which contributed around 1% of the country's annual GDP for three days.
Bangladesh sacrificed over 10 million animals: one for every 16 citizens. Saudi
Arabia slaughtered an estimated 1.5 million with imports from Romania, Spain
and Sudan. Include the Muslim minority in Indonesia, the Muslim community in
Turkey, Egypt, Nigeria and in other European and North American countries.
Worldwide: 50,000,000 animals. Three days.
And that's just the cost of the animal itself, not to mention
other costs like the feed, water and additional expenses needed to keep the
animals alive. The true impact is much greater. The annual world-wide rawhide
harvest is approximately 60% during Eid. The raw materials of the leather industry
are obtained in Bangladesh half by Eid al-Adha alone throughout the year. That
leather, which is leather, winds up as shoes and handbags in Italian and
American shops, without a tag to identify it as leather from the field in
Lahore or Dhaka.
The difference in education here is not just a cultural one.
It is economic. Those who fail to consider this event are missing a crucial
piece of the puzzle when it comes to how global supply chains and consumer
behavior in emerging markets are developing.
Not all years are hunky-dunky. In 2025, the numbers decreased
significantly. There was a drop of 57 percent in available sacrificial animals
in Jakarta, caused by foot and mouth disease and rising prices. In Pakistan,
summer heat had a negative impact on the hides which were not collected before
it was an extreme heat and almost ruined the raw leather market. However, the
festival was not to be stopped. It never does.
Under Islamic law, up to six families can share a single
animal if a Muslim’s income is not sufficient to buy it for himself. People who
have no money are just the ones getting the meat, and that's the way it's
supposed to be. This is a lesson in its own, that a tradition of peace and a
shared responsibility does not fail under pressure where market driven systems
do. It will absorb the impact and keep on feeding people anyway.
IMF is not monitoring this. Bloomberg isn't reporting on it.
The event that moves $100 billion in 72 hours and nourishes millions of the
world's poorest and neediest is at best a footnote in the culture and at worst
invisible.
This is a failure of education at the top. The lack of a
capacity and interest in grasping the analytical value of Eid al-Adha is not
just a financial and policy institutional missed opportunity, it is also a
missed opportunity. They are adding to the misconceptions that hinder peaceful
world. There you will never be able to make bridges between civilizations you
don't study. You can't make peace with a people you never took the time to
know.
The Eid al-Adha statistics tell a true story of the economic
well-being and social integration of almost 2 billion people. It is more than
that, this festival is a blueprint of what the world has spent billions of
dollars to create with foreign aid and development finance, a self-sustaining,
community-driven system of redistribution that creates peace from the ground,
each and every year, without any single bureaucrat to coordinate.
The world doesn't need to believe in God to value His
creation. That requires a bit of schooling, however.
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