Traders in Accra seek specific days, places for trading
Petty traders and itinerant market women have suggested to the Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) to demarcate specific areas in the metropolis where they could trade.
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According to the traders, the inability of the AMA to allocate specific areas for them to do their business was the reason why they were scattered all over the city and were trading at unapproved places.
The traders made reference to Thailand, whose petty traders have given days on which they could go about their businesses in the city without trouble.
The Country Director of the Women in Informal Employment; Globalising and Organising (WIEGO), Mrs Dorcas Ansah, made this known at a workshop held in Accra for itinerant traders.
The workshop was organised by the Local Economic Development (LED) and the People’s Dialogue (PD), both non-governmental organisations, with support from the Rockefeller Foundation. It had the objective of brainstorming for a sustainable plan by which the traders would have a secured place to ply their trade and have greater inclusion in the AMA’s programmes for the metropolis.
Also present at the workshop besides informal traders, hawkers and head porters (Kayayei), were representatives of the AMA, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Institute of Local Government Studies (ILGS) and various trade organisations.
According to LED, of the 214,500 traders, hawkers, street vendors and head porters in Accra, 88 per cent were women who ply their businesses on the streets, on rail lines and on sidewalks of roads.
Market days
Mrs Dorcas Ansah said city authorities should allocate specific days and areas for the traders to enable them to trade and ensure sanity in the city, which would also help to reduce waste generated in the city.
Making reference to Thailand, she said the authorities in that country had designated places and days for such category of traders to do their business without hitches or intimidation.
Spatial planning
A Senior Planning Officer of the Town and Country Planning with the AMA, Mrs Patience Nyarko, educated the traders on spatial planning in the city.
According to her, a strict observance of the spatial planning by the traders would enable them to run their businesses in the right places.
She said it was improper for the traders to be scattered all over the city as that affected planning and added that the authority was committed to engaging traders in a dialogue to find a lasting solution to challenges they faced.
Mrs Nyarko said, “No matter what we do, petty traders would be with us. So we have to find a way of helping them rather than to do away with them.”
Some of the traders who shared their opinion refuted claims that they were the people who littered the city indiscriminately.