Informal Trading is defined as, "any person that carries on a business as a street vendor, hawker and includes an employee of such person and for the purpose of this by-law, includes any person who trades in a public place" also "the selling of goods and services within a space deemed to be public property or road within the informal sector"
Andre Joost opened by noting that there are 52 million consumers in South Africa and a huge inter-provincial movement within the country. Around South Africa's cities there are large informal settlements and a huge number of informal traders. "There are big changes taking place within South Africa just now, we have a significant growth in the the middle classes and one of their main expenditures is on food, and one of the main channels of buying it is through informal traders."
Currently there is 6.7 million Rand of fruit and vegetables traded within the informal sector. The Informal sector contributes 8-10% of South Africa's GDP. This sector accounts for 55% of the fruit and vegetable trade done by South Africa's fruit and veg markets.
"Informal traders are adaptable and mobile, they don't need to bother with formalities and have very competitive prices," explains Jooste. "They are positioned at near by traffic routes, homes and workplaces giving easy access to commuters (2 million per week), they have low overheads and can meet consumer's needs."
He stated that Informal does equal Inferior and in order to develop this sector the challenges must be looked at. The main challenges are Security of Tenure - right to trade, Marketing and Selling Space, Logistics and Finance.
This was echoed by Rosheda Muller who has worked in Informal Trading for 25 years, "We get permits from local municipalities, which have to be renewed month to month, we work in dingy selling places, face inclement weather with no facilities. Most of us don't have a bank account never mind access to finance."
Gavin Hill said that the needs of the informal traders in the rural regions are different to those in the cities, some of the traders have to travel huge distances and have no food security. "We have decided to assist small scale farmers by supplying them good quality potato seeds at reduced prices enabling them to become better farmers"
Simgangela Sekgobela explained what Jo'burg market is doing to try to assist these traders, "We try to provide the infrastructure for them, protections from the weather for example. We also offer training on packaging and shelf-life. Some of these traders carry a lot of cash around so we give them security. We do not want to formalise this section but to help them."
Grant Norman who has spent a lot of time engaging with informal traders said, "This is a very sophisticated buyer at the markets, they want good quality at the right price, we need to understand this."
Rosheda who said she was there to rebrand the informal sector. "With help from Grant we have drafted a MOU, setting a precedent for our industry and putting in place our terms of reference with our formal government." In the past she admits they have been too fragmented and quoted the slogan, 'Nothing for Us Without Us'.
She called for the support of the people in the room to help develop informal trading, the members of the panel were in agreement that any changes or developments made should be done in partnership with the informal traders.
In the question and answer part of the discussion one lady in the audience asked that if the informal traders were going to get so much help and support from the industry and possibly the government, what would they be giving back in return? To which Rosheda reminded everyone that these informal traders lived way below the poverty line, in sub-standard housing with barely enough money to feed themselves never mind being eligible to pay income tax.