Appendix I

Brief Description of the Markets where the Fieldwork was Conducted

The following section briefly describes the nine markets that were the sites of this research:

Mercado de artículos varios: Located in south-central Guayaquil, this large market is one of the newest markets in the city and has vending spots for a variety of articles ranging from furniture to electronics to lingerie. This market is located in an area that was known for a high crime rate and the sales of stolen items in the past. In fact, the vendors described a time in which they had to pay a local mafia that controlled the streets in order to be able to sell their merchandise more or less safely.

Mercado Oeste: Located on south-central Guayaquil it is among the oldest markets in the city. In fact, there was an old market establishment before the intervention of the City Council of Guayaquil. The intervention for this market consisted of renovation and reorganization; however there was a previous structure here. Most of the articles sold in this market are food items.

Asisclo Garay: Similarly to the Mercado Oeste, this market was simply reorganized and re-constructed by the City Council of Guayaquil in the nineties. Previously, vendors gathered in this same location in south-central Guayaquil to sell their products and worked under an old market structure that had been left forgotten since the late sixties. Nonetheless, in the past they had to pay local gangs that controlled the market area for their spots. Therefore, as the vendors put it, paying the City Council has not hurt their profits and they feel safer now than they did in the past.

Mapasinge: Located in western Guayaquil, this market was built to gather vendors that sold outside in what is know in Ecuador as ferias libres (free fairs). What a feria libre entails is basically a large gathering of vendors in the streets that would be selling to the public together on set days and times. In the Mapasinge neighborhood many vendors had participated in ferias libres around the area for many years and now work together in the City Council market.

San Francisco de Asís: Also in western Guayaquil, the San Francisco de Asís market gathered different street vendors that had sold in and around the neighborhood. One of the most important problems that the vendors in these markets described was the fact that there is an increasing number of corner stores in the area which have taken away their trade.

Sauces 9 and Sauces 4 markets: These two markets are quite interesting due to their closeness and the fact that many of the vendors used to share adjacent workspaces when they worked in the streets. The story behind these two markets had to do with the fact that the city council wanted to move vendors that located themselves on the streets of the Sauces neighborhood (which is divided into several sections) in northeast Guayaquil to hold ferias libres. As a result of the intervention, the vendors were grouped into the two Sauces 9 and Sauces 4 markets.

The most important differences between these two markets are size, type of products sold and location. Firstly, the Sauces 9 market is much larger than the Sauces 4 market and it is located on a major avenue, which gives it a relative advantage when competing with the nearby Sauces 4 market. In addition the Sauces 9 market for the most part has vendors that sell perishable food products and products for the home. On the other hand, the Sauces 4 market has more stands selling various products like clothing, school supplies, party supplies and the like. Many of the Sauces 4 vendors that were interviewed had complaints regarding the location of the market because they are working in a back street that is harder to find as well as the competition of the larger, better located Sauces 9 market. In addition they argued that they cannot compete with 1) the informal vendors that are still working in the adjacent streets and have refused to join the program and 2) the corner stores that have continually grown in this neighborhood.

Nuevo San Jacinto: This market works under very unique conditions because of its location. It is located in the northwest of Guayaquil and is in close proximity to the wholesale market that delivers products to all the other markets in the City Council Market Chain. The problematic aspect of this location is that customers get angry when they find that the prices here are higher than those of the nearby wholesale market. The vendors in the Nuevo San Jacinto market feel that the wholesale market should be open only to the vendors of the City Council Market Chain and not to the general public. This would allow for higher profit for the vendors in the City Council markets and the chain of markets could prosper better.

Batallón del Suburbio: The last market that was included in the study involved the vendors in the Batallón del Suburbio market located on the south-west side of Guayaquil. This market is in a relatively high-crime, low-income area of the city. The majority of the products sold in this market are food products including meats, vegetables, fruits, ketchup, tuna, etc, as well as other products for the home like cleaning supplies and ketchup.