SADKI-STROYEVKA, Ukraine — A cold wind whips through the streets. Vehicles that enter must drive through a foot-deep, moatlike bath of disinfectant, lest their tires track in disease. Computers raise and lower the levels of light to match circadian rhythms.

The scene is one of emptiness. One in four buildings is deserted. Fewer delivery trucks arrive than in years past.

As in much of Ukraine, hard times have befallen the Slovyany farm and its million or so inhabitants — all of them chickens.

“We could be a player, and not a small one,” said a forlorn Oleg Bakhmatyuk, the owner of Avangard, Ukraine’s biggest egg producer. “We could be a major supplier.”