Market Vendors Say Current Regulations Will Affect Their Livelihoods

The fight over market days at the Michael Finnegan Market may not be over. On Tuesday, we reported on retail farmers turned away because the law designates Tuesdays and Fridays for wholesalers, and Saturdays for retailers only. But some farmers argue that restricting them to one day is hurting their ability to earn a living. We asked the market manager if there was room for amendments to the law. His answer was yes, but not overnight, and not without going through the proper process.

 

Delroy Herrera, Market Manager, Belize City Council

“Public consultation is always good because that’s how you get your feedback once you’re in political life. The market right now, I understand we are at capacity inside, but I think the consultation that we would like is that for our people to come, the small farmers, whatever the case may be, and come to the table, and then let’s discuss the problem that they’re facing, because some of these farmers are facing problems in their own districts. And so they come here, and they already feel like they are being bamboozled in their districts, so they come here to get a free up and so forth, and then we have laws. Every house has rules, right? And so it’s simple to understand the rule, to work around the rule, or to amend the rule, but we have to do it respectfully, and we have to do it with the constraint of the law. And once we have that done, then from there we can do whatever amendment and so forth that needs to be done to incorporate everybody so that everybody can move harmoniously, the city council, the local farmers, and everything. So we have to listen to every single buyer so we can write this proposal and present it, and then we go from there to see if we can get local government to amend or the Belize City Council to amend what we’re doing.”

 

Herrera says the council cannot act on scattered individual complaints. For any real change to happen, retail vendors will need to unite, bring their concerns to the table as one voice, and give the process a chance to work.

 

Attention readers: This online newscast is a direct transcript of our evening television broadcast. When speakers use Kriol, we have carefully rendered their words using a standard spelling system.

 

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