A case of so near - yet so far and no farther
Taking a draft ordinance as a legal step granting street vendors the right to carry on their trade would be misinterpreting it, says Luo Yameng, secretary general of the national joint meeting of the directors of all Chengguan (urban management) bureaus in the country.
According to the ordinance, released late last month to seek public opinion, street vendors can apply for registration as individual industrial or commercial entities. This has widely been read as a green light to street vendors, whose constant disputes and occasional clashes with Chengguan officers have raised great social concern.
"In fact, the government granted street vendors their rightful status 22 years ago by designating the sites for individual industrial or commercial entities to run their trade, including the scope to hawk their wares in some areas," Luo says.
So the point is not whether street vendors have a rightful status. The real problem is that in practice, vendors seldom apply for registration as a prerequisite to earn their rightful status, he says. Very few vendors apply for registration because it has become redundant; vendors' business has become unsteady, and industry and commerce authorities don't have enough personnel to manage them.
The majority at the joint meeting believed that most of the street vendors and hawkers, whose business is not fixed to a place or time, don't apply for registration. A hawker in Beijing was cited as having said: "Our business is on a shoestring budget, and we choose places where more people assemble. I've never thought about applying for registration. Does the application involve paying money?"
"Clashes and disputes between Chengguan officers and street vendors are actually a problem we face in managing urban public space," Luo says. "The rude behavior of some Chengguan officers and the impulsive reaction of some vendors both are to blame for creating such a situation."
In fact, the relevant industry and commerce departments are responsible for managing street vendors and penalizing unregistered or unauthorized vendors. Chengguan officers come on the scene only when the vendors occupy public spaces illegally.
"Seeking public opinion on the draft ordinance offers a good chance to further clarify different departments' liabilities. The industry and commerce authorities cannot merely charge the vendors for registration and leave the onus of managing them to others," Luo says.
Chengguan officers, he says, respond daily to residents' complaints against noise, fumes and pollution caused by street vendors, though they do not have a legal basis to do so.
Moreover, the draft ordinance says street vendors should carry on their business in areas designated by the local governments. But it is very difficult to ensure such an arrangement, says Jia Tian, director of Chengguan bureau in Dongyang, Zhejiang province.
"Once an area has been designated, who decides which vendors have the right to carry on their business there?" Jia says. "How does one ensure coordination among the vendors? And how does one implement the policy if the designated areas are remote and vendors return to the busy streets?"
"People should realize that it's neither possible to ensure that all the street vendors apply for registration as individual industrial and commercial entities, nor is it realistic to declare all of them illegal," Luo says.
(China Daily 08/19/2009 page9)
