Street Hawkers of Dhaka City: Problems and Prospects

1. Introduction:

Bangladesh is 3rd world country. But about 28% live in urban areas. For better citizen facility people live in urban area like Dhaka City which is the biggest city of the country. This city is not well planned. For this reason various problems have to face by mass people especially in communication sector. Municipal bodies are not able to provide sufficient marketing place for buyers and sellers. As a result street venders are operating their informal business as a temporary process without a sustainable management system for the lack of authority involvement in Dhaka City. Due to that lack of responsibility, street vendors are creating problems, street garbage and crowed the footpaths in urban areas.

But a large number of urban dwellers depend on the street vendors to maintain their life expenses as a job or for shopping. Due to the eviction of street vendors part of urban dweller would be in a critical situation in Dhaka City. Based on these issues, street vending is an essential urban trade sector for a large number of urban dwellers in Dhaka City as a part of their urban lives. However, due to the informal situation at present, local government cannot do anything other than eviction them and street venders cannot operate their business without being harassed. Local authority has to create a management system for street vendors so that street venders could operate their business with self responsibility and the authority could collect legal taxes from the street vendors. This public management system should be organized by local government with participation from urban street venders and local people as a community work. Then the public management of street vendors will be more responsible in their urban area. Doing so, street vendors will become beneficial for both urban dwellers and street vendors and it will become an urban identity for Dhaka City as well as South Asian developing cities.

1.1 Background and context

Street vendors are an integral component of urban economies around the world. Distributors of affordable goods and services, they provide consumers with convenient and accessible retail options and form a vital part of the social and economic life of a city. Street vending as an occupation has existed for hundreds of years and is considered a cornerstone of many cities’ historical and cultural heritage.

According to city authorities, academics, and local NGOs, there are about 90,000 street vendors in Dhaka city; A street hawker is a common figure in Bangladesh. Now a day he is seen to sell goods as moving shops. He sells things of common use or fancy items. He carries his goods in a bag or in a basket. He sometimes carries his moving shop on his bicycle or on a pushing car. He walks along in the roads by calling the names of his articles by singing a song or by ringing a bell. His peculiar calls draw the attention of children, women, folk and simple persons.

A hawker sells children & women’s favorite things, such as: toys, dolls, biscuits, cakes, ice-cream, sweet meats, fruits etc. He sometimes sells common necessary things, such as: clothes, cookeries, vegetables, newspapers, magazines and many other necessary and fancy articles. A street hawker is a man of jolly nature. He sometimes sings comic songs or plays flute or shows some magic in order to get the attention of people around him. Then he approaches with a smiling face and he declares his items are the best from others. By his pleasant words he convinces the people and able to sell his goods at a high rate. He some times deceives his customers both in kind and quality. Maybe they do this for their poverty.A street hawker is highly welcomed by the children. He is a favorite person to them. Sometimes he deceives with the children, women and simple people. So some people do not like him.

Dhaka City has a large number of urban dwellers who are poor and have no formal skills to get jobs in formal sectors. They often become street vender in urban areas. Most of them are rural-urban migrant due to the lack of work facilities and public services in rural area. Being a street vendor is one of the best job opportunities for them as informal activities. In addition, poor urban dwellers can not fulfill their basic need without those informal activities in urban areas. For example, the venders operate their street business and depend on it; so, they cannot provide foods, cloths, and shelters for their families without these

informal activities. Most of South Asian developing cities have a large number of street vendors as an informal trade in the main urban transaction points as well as Dhaka City. The local authorities of Dhaka City see that, the street vendors a Problem for their urban area. Without street vending in urban areas a large number of urban dwellers fall into a critical situation in their lives. Not only the low-income group but also the middle-income group of urban dweller depends on street vendor for shopping in their life. According to the Dhaka City Corporation (DCC) report.

In the Dhaka City Corporation (DCC) area 60% houses are of low-income, 37% middle income and the rest 3% constitutes high-income houses are in the Dhaka City, Bangladesh. Based on this report, more than 60% of urban dwellers depend on urban street vendors. However, the local authority has no proper rehabilitation policy for their street vendors. Sometime the authority evicts them from their area and venders become jobless due to this eviction from their urban area.So, this problem is not only the problem of Dhaka City but also other 3rd

world countries.

1.2 Statement of the problem

Street vendors are illegally possessed on the public sidewalk, thus they are not originally designed in a city street planning, which inherited various problem such as unpleasant urban cape and especially obstruction for pedestrian. The word Problem in this case does not have its usual meaning. If the street vendor is usually a Problem for urban areas, removal or eviction is one of the best solutions for Dhaka City as well as other South Asian developing cities. However, when the local authorities evict the street vendors from urban area it becomes a Problem for a large number of urban dwellers. Especially, whose lives are being maintained by street vendors or access shops from the street vendors in their urban live. A large number of urban dwellers considerations, street vendors are part of their lives as jobs or as shopping center in Dhaka City. According to the urban situation, it can be considered that, street vending is an important urban informal trade sector, not a Problem for urban area of Dhaka City.

Street hawker creates two major problems in Dhaka City. They are as follow:

1) Street Garbage: The venders dispose of their garbage on the footpaths or on the streets after their sale in urban area of Dhaka City. Sometimes the food is sold wrapped by using paper, and consumers throw that paper on the street. According to this issue, street garbage’s problem has a strong relation with urban street vending in Dhaka City.

2) Footpath Crowded: From January 2007 street vending is strictly prohibited in the urban area of Dhaka City until next EID of that year. The general people who have no relation with street vendors, they are happy for this eviction. As one local newspaper published in a report “Usually I was compelled to walk through the main road risking being run over by speeding vehicles as street vendors kept footpaths occupied. But this research, have a question for him, what is the necessity of street vendors in Dhaka City?

This research field is a central part of problem of footway of Dhaka City urban area. It was selected as some specific urban area based on the main transaction point or an important and a good place for street vending in Dhaka City. There are some inner-city bus stops, Rickshaw stands, inter district connection, and other transportation systems located here. In addition, some important offices or educational institute or shopping centers is located at that place. For those reasons, a large number of urban dwellers use these areas for their daily commute and street venders take this chance to operate their street business in those areas.

1.3 Brief review of related research

Based on the field survey of Dhaka City, Street vendors operate by four different types of vending systems in urban areas: Permanent, Semi-Permanent, Semi-Mobile, and Mobile. Permanent types of vendors were doing their street business as permanent shop and they put their goods on the street after the business day. Some of them have a relation with

nearest shop as an external business on the urban street. Their income level is good compared with other vendors. Semi-permanent vendors were one of the biggest numbers of street vendors in Dhaka City and according to the vender’s opinion from different area they strongly affected by the government’s eviction. After sale, they bring their goods home and put their business’s platform and stand on the urban footpaths for next day.

Their income level is not so good compared with permanent one. Semi-mobile vendors were the temporary street business in urban area of Dhaka City. They don’t put up their existence in an urban footpath after their business. Some of them were providing their own products like fruits, snacks, and handicaps etc. Their income level is not good and some children operate this kind of street vendors in Dhaka City. Mobile venders were moving in different urban areas to sell their goods to the moving urban dwellers. Some of them were selling in transportation vehicles. Based on their business condition, they were extreme poor in Dhaka City and their income was very low in their urban lives.

It was selected study area in Dhaka City and it has a large number of urban problems as well as other South Asian developing cities. Urban street vending process is one of them which is indicated as a Problem by the local authority.

2. Conceptual framework:

Generally we think street hawkers are those person or people who sells various things by crying them in the street; hence, a peddler or a packman. Their aim is to sell goods by outcry in the street.The term “street hawker” is typically used interchangeably with “street trader,” “vendor,” and “peddler.” There are also many local terms and regional variations like “Feriwala”.

A street vendor is broadly defined as a person who offers goods for sale to the public without having a permanent built-up structure from which to sell. Street vendors may be stationary in the sense that they occupy space on the pavements or other public/private spaces or, they may be

mobile in the sense they move from place to place by carrying their wares on push carts or in baskets on their heads. In this proposal, the term ‘street hawker’ includes stationary as well as mobile vendors and it incorporates all other local/region specific terms used to describe them.The number of street vendors in Bangladesh is large. Dhaka is the capital of Bangladesh and also its largest city. According to the Dhaka City Corporation (both north and south) there are around 90,000 street vendors in the city. They operate mainly in Motijheel, Baitul Mukarram, Gulistan, Farmgate, Shahbagh, Elephant Road and New Market Areas etc. Street vending is considered an illegal trade and the street vendors face constant harassment from the authorities. The vendors have to pay a sizeable part of their income as bribes in order to keep plying their trade.

Street hawkers are sometimes distinguished from vendors who operate in the types of public spaces that are not specifically streets or related to streets – train stations, buses, public parks, and so on – but most commonly the term is used inclusively. Street hawkers are frequently distinguished from vendors who operate in officially sanctioned off-street markets, which may be public or private. In many countries, street vendors are relocated to public (municipal) markets or buildings that are privately owned and converted to off-street markets under the aegis of municipal programmes. Once they move off the streets, these vendors are typically referred to as market vendors or micro entrepreneurs, although their businesses otherwise remain much the same.

Local terms distinguish between different types of street vendors, based on the time or place in which they work. In official statistics in some countries, street vendors are a subset of the category “informal traders,” which also includes people who trade from their h The academic literature on street vending commonly treats street vendors broadly as those who sell goods or services in public space. This includes the full gamut of goods and services, traded on a wholesale or retail basis, in streets and other kinds of related public spaces – including sidewalks, alleyways, and medians. Street vendors may have fixed stalls such as kiosks, semi-fixed stalls like folding tables; they may operate from crates, collapsible stands, or wheeled pushcarts that are moved and stored overnight. Other vendors sell from fixed locations without a stall structure, displaying their merchandise on cloth/plastic sheets; mobile vendors walk or bicycle through the streets as they sell.

3. Objective and Scope of the research:

This study seeks to clarify the real situation and contextual factors that affect their vending process that means other environmental factors which can be negative or positive. We also try to identify the root level scenario as well as the real picture of street hawkers. How they contribute on our economy? In their vending process how they create problem? What impact they can bring on our socio-economic condition and daily life specially the middle and lower level income people as well as the marginal people? Through this research we want to fulfill our curicity about the street hawkers and their life including their social, economic, political, cultural, financial and other factors or conditions of their life. How the dwellers of Dhaka City can be positively affected and also negatively affected? We also try to understand their living condition as well as their housing facilities etc. and the problem created in the urban area of Dhaka City. We also put some social question relating their daily and real life. In addition, it conceders the informal economic activities relating to the street environment of Dhaka City as follow:

i. To find out the real street vending process that has create a problem for the urban street environment in Dhaka City.

ii. To analyze the necessity of street vendors and public management systems for the street vendors in Dhaka City.

iii. This study seeks to clarifyiv. The real situation of vending and shoppingv. The urban street venders’ perception in individual research area

in Dhaka City vi. Collecting data by field observation in Dhaka City.

vii. Analyzing the primary and secondary data from relevant sources.viii. Consulting with venders and customers in vending areas of Dhaka

City.ix. Collecting some digital data for analyzing the real issue of

vending situation in Dhaka CityThis research aimed to analyze the data, vendor’s comment, observation’s episodic, and venders and public precipitation. In addition it will be shown how street venders will benefit from their informal vending in their urban lives? We will make our research in different areas of Dhaka City like Motijheel, Baitul Mukarram Area, Gulistan, Farmgate, Elephant Road and New Market Area.

4. Research questions:

In this research we have two main hypotheses about the problem of street hawkers. We want to make a picture of their problems focusing on these major questions

1. Why and how street hawkers still survive if they are creating so much trouble in public places?

2. What is the real situation of street hawkers from their perspective, as well as from others?

3. Are street hawkers, as a part of the society, contributing economically or socially?

5. Methodology:

5.1 Identification of problems and design of questionnaire

In order to attain the research objectives we aimed at conducting a survey to collect primary data for analysis. The thousand of detailed discussion in the context of Dhaka City prompted us to gain a first hand knowledge from the field. One of our objectives was to identify the kinds of impediments that exist in this business as perceived by the vendors. Since the existing literature did not help us much in this regard, we decided to conduct a preliminary survey using a semi-structured questionnaire on street food vendors from three different places of Dhaka city. The purpose was to list the major problems suggested from the entrepreneurs’ point of view.

A total of 90-100 vendors will participate in this preliminary survey and they have to state top ten problems they face as an entrepreneur in this business and also of their vending process. Following is the list of problems they identified as major ones: What is important to note from the vendors’ response is that safety is not identified as a major challenge for them (the vendors). Perhaps there exists a lack of awareness from the

vendors’ side or this aspect is more of a concern for observers thinking of consumers’ right as well as citizen right.

Using the information obtained from the preliminary survey, we created a structured questionnaire to carry out the investigation for analysis. The listed problems were used as scale items to execute a further attitudinal survey in order to test the research hypotheses.

5.2 Source and reliability of data

The survey, using the structured questionnaire, took place in 5 different locations of Dhaka city where concentration of street vendors is relatively high. These places include bus, railway, and launch stations, parks, busy market places and other such public spaces. We received responses from 90-100 vendors.The respondents will be asked to provide their opinion on the various scale items discussed above. In the scale of various indicators they can strongly agree and moderately agree respectively, while other indicates no comment, and 1 and 2 refer to strongly disagree and moderately disagree respectively. These various scale items were assessed for reliability using coefficient alpha.

5.3 Tools of analysis

With the collected data we will primarily carry out two types of analysis using statistical software or a statically term.

We also make an interview about the problem and prospect of the street vendors from these people;

President of Hawker Association One or two economist Urban Planner Media Urban middle class people Social worker Journalist

Advocates and experts in this field etc

We use the local or native language when we make conduct them to identify the real picture of these types of people. We also make a friendly and positive relation in the conversation with them.

6. References:

[1] SOLID WASTE MANAGEMENT IN DHAKA CITY” AZM SHAFIQUL ISLAM CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER DHAKA CITY CORPORATION.

[2] “Jung-Hyung LEE, “Characteristic Analysis of Street Vendors In New Market area in Dhaka City. For this policy, street Seoul Korea,” Proceedings of Asian Street Vendor Research Symposium pp 3-1 to 3-10, September 28, 2004

[3] Leonvan den Dool, “Making Local Government Work,” Institute for Housing and Urban Development Studies (IHS), Erasmus University Rotterdam (EUR) pp 23, October 2005

[4] Parvin Khaleda “Vendors start occupying footpaths ahead of Eid”, New Age, 25th September 2006.

[5] “City walkways free from hawkers” The Daily Star, January 19, 2007

[6] Profile of Dhaka City Corporation,” Published by Urban Planning Department DCC, April 2004

[7] “Map of Dhaka City Corporation” Urban Planning Department, Dhaka City Corporation; April 2004

[8] Nazrul Islam, Dhaka Now: Contemporary Urban Development, Bangladesh Geographical Society (BGS), Dhaka. 2005

[9] Atsushi Deguchi “Re-Evolution Street vendors in Asian cities and Asian Urbanism” 8th International Conference of the Asian Planning School Association, 2005