It never rains for Gweru vendors. . .
THE livelihoods of some residents in Gweru’s Mtapa and Mkoba suburbs is dependent on informal trading, with over 300 vendors operating at the yet to be refurbished Mtapa market.
But the heavy rainfall experienced in Gweru in recent weeks has crippled livelihoods for informal traders at Mtapa after their workstation was affected by flooding.
Flash floods destroyed market stalls and the clogging water left some wares in the water, resulting in significant income losses.
Only a few managed to remove their wares from the marketplace. Up to now, the place is still inhabitable and this will remain like this up to the end of the rainy season.
One of the vegetable vendors at Mtapa market, Hazel Hungwe, said she had not been able to work for the past 10 days and she has suffered losses of between US$20 and US$30.
“It never rains, but pours for us here at Mtapa market because we can no longer work and at the same time we are counting losses on perishable fruits and vegetables like tomatoes, mangoes, potatoes, onions and other green vegetables,” she said.
“We blame the city council for failure to build proper vending stalls over the past two years.”
Most traders at the Mtapa market said while they were battling with low sales usually experienced in January, the situation is becoming unbearable as household food security is now compromised
Kudzanai and Kombayi markets closed in March 2020 following a Government directive to restore sanity in the city by building modern market stalls and proper ablution facilities.
Government directed local authorities to take advantage of the Covid-19 lockdown to restore order in their cities.
Midlands Vendors Association ( MVA) secretary Angeline Zivanai said the city council was losing a lot of money by their failure to upgrade the Mtapa market.
“Climate change is having a devastating impact on the livelihoods of vendors and it is incumbent upon the city council to plan ahead. This place has been neglected in so many ways. The roads are no longer navigable and a toilet is yet to be completed,” she said.
“We do not understand the lack of seriousness on the part of our council. They cannot collect anything because we are just like people selling in the forest. We demand proper facilities and reliable water provision so that the council can start collecting their revenue.”
Urban floods are entirely man-made, with poorly maintained drains, plastic bags and trash shrinking free passage for water to flow.
Flooding has resulted in water accumulating on roads and causing potholes.
Gweru Deputy Mayor, councillor Cleopas Shiri, says council has amended by-laws to ensure favourable working conditions for vendors.
“We have just completed the amendment of Gweru city council by-laws which will now recognize vending as a formal and central source of income,” he said. “We are setting up markets in each high density suburb so that traders do not have to go far in search of orders. Only the suppliers will be travelling to the markets.
“As you know, we inherited council by-laws which were put in place by our colonisers and such provisions for the informal economy were not favourable. We have since realized that the Zimbabwean economy is now largely informal and the by-laws must catch up with reality.”
Meanwhile, Gweru Residents Association director, Cornelia Selipiwe, said Gweru residents were living in bad conditions as the flash floods also affected some households in low lying areas and left some families homeless.
“We are talking of a double tragedy because residents have lost income sources and safe shelter. Some houses in parts of Mkoba, Montrose and Ascot suburbs were
also affected,” said Selipiwe.
“We have a council which is continually failing to be proactive in terms of disaster planning and preparedness. Gweru has previously faced outbreaks of cholera, typhoid and diarrhoeal diseases, and hence council should prioritise health provision.
“Drainage overflow can be a major source of pollution. It picks up potentially harmful substances from roads, factories, gutters and drains, including oil, household chemicals and faecal material, and transfers them to streets and urban water courses. Indeed, disaster is looming in our city.”
Gweru District Department of Civil Protection vice chairperson, Tarisayi Mudadigwa, confirmed that 980 households in Gweru were affected by the flash floods from the heavy rains that hit the city in recent weeks.
Vendors face various problems during the rainy season or due to heavy rainfall which often leads to flooding.
The council needs to step up efforts to construct shelters which cannot be inundated by floods.
Along with the residents, vendors suffer greatly in this situation in terms of livelihood, business, and existence.
Vendors, who live on the daily sales from the temporary or semi-permanent
business, are greatly affected by the urban flooding.
Economic experts say vendor business has significant contribution in the economy and authorities need to pay attention to their shelter needs and ablution services.
Heavy rains have pounded the country in recent months, resulting in loss of lives, property and infrastructure worth millions of dollars.
Zimbabwe is forecasted to receive normal to above normal rains in the current 2021/22 summer season.
In recent years, urban areas in Zimbabwe have been hit particularly hard by flooding. Disaster risk experts say increasing risk, combined with changing climatic conditions, points to an urgent need for the prioritisation of urban flood risk management on the political and policy agenda.
“Urban floods stem from a combination of various meteorological and hydrological extremes, such as extreme precipitation and flows in short spans of time,” said a disaster risk expert in a recent report.
“These factors, along with unplanned growth and development in floodplains, poor urban development practices and failure of flood protection infrastructure, pose a serious challenge to human lives and public development, particularly in developing nations,”