Vendors are providing unfair competition

Dec 05, 2017 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

A young vendor selling beverages at a busy junction has increased the price of a small bottle of water. The bottle used to sell for $100 but following the Budget, the price increased to $120. When he was asked how it was that the price of the bottled water had increased, the vendor answered that “the price of everything has increased.”
This is not so. The price of everything has not increased. There can be no justification for the increase in the price of a bottle of water. In fact, the product was specially designed to be able to sell for $100.
This was days after the Minister of Finance presented the country’s Budget for 2018. Nothing in that presentation would have led to an increase in prices. Persons are taking advantage of the fears of people following the reading of the Budget.
Prior to the Budget, some shops were retailing a one litre bottle of aerated drink for $300, which represents an increase over what it used to sell for before. Consumers are being ripped off by the very persons who are described as poor and trying to earn a living.
It is one thing to try to earn a living, but another thing to try to do so at the expense of consumers. A great deal more is happening that is not right and consumers need protection.
No one is calling for a return to price control. That experiment was disastrous for Guyanese. It led to increases in the prices of items and it led to artificial shortages being created so as to push the prices up.
There is without doubt a downturn in business activity. You can walk into any business in Regent Street and notice the discernible decline in sales. Money is not circulating and the reason for this is because of illegal competition.
Vendors are taking over Regent Street, the busiest street in the capital. For every person employed in a store on Regent Street, there is a vendor selling outside. The centre of the City is assuming the look of a refugee camp. Is this how the government intends to promote business, by allowing unfair competition?
Most of these vendors are not poor people. A few Sundays ago, a vendor was selling outside of the old Brown Betty. The items that were being sold included TV antennas and electronic items. The value of what was being advertised for sale that morning would have exceeded a million dollars.
If you go down Regent Street early some mornings, you will notice that some of these vendors appear in their fancy Toyota Premio , unloading hundreds of thousands of dollars in stock. They are not poor people.
Someone tried to suggest that these were items which they were taking on credit. But what about the legitimate businessman? Is he not also taking credit from the bank? How can anyone expect money to be circulating in the economy when the underground economy is enjoying an unfair advantage?
There are some small businesses who are struggling to pay their rent. There are some hairdressers who have to depend on male companions to help them pay their debts at the end of the month, while there are persons cutting hair on the Merriman Mall.
The encouragement which is being given to unlawful vending is part of a long, but failed campaign to crowd out legitimate businesses. It is hurting the economy.
Vendors are going to retard business development. The vendors have turned parts of Port of Spain into an eyesore, so much so that middle class Trinidadians do not venture to the areas where the vendors sell.
The same is happening in Guyana. Some persons do not go anywhere near Stabroek Market. You can hardly walk freely along the pavement on Regent Street. Vendors are everywhere and they are laying out for sale hundreds of thousands of dollars in stock. They do not have to pay overheads; they do not have to pay taxes. But they are getting a free ride, because this sort of activity has been encouraged for years.
There are also far too many businesses being established for such a small economy. The size of Guyana’s economy cannot support so many small businesses. And the reason for the expansion of these businesses is because zoning has gone through the window. Businesses are opening all over. And the majority of them will go bust, because there are more sellers than buyers.
The government has to create order. It has to limit the conversion of residential areas into business areas. The spending power in the economy is simply not there to support business development when faced with unfair competition.

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Vendors are providing unfair competition

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