Cross-border traders, who commonly refer to themselves as ”pathfinders”, have emerged from an era of marginalisation, stigmatisation and harassment to urge governments in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) to recognise them as citizens engaged in economic activities that will enable them to move out of poverty.
Some of the problems that lead members of the Southern Africa Cross Border Traders’ Association (SACBTA) into illegal activities are corruption, illiteracy among traders and lack of a simplified trade in the SADC, including the lack of sensitisation to trading regulations, the difficulty of access to import-export documentation and problems in the case of countries that, for example, carry dual membership, such as SADC and the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa.
At SACBTA we’ve found there’s a need to increase the freedom of movement of people, goods and services under SADC regulations.
About 80% of cross-border traders are women, most of whom are the sole breadwinners for their families; they work on buses and at border entry points, which makes them vulnerable to crime and HIV/Aids.
But graduation from informal to formal trader has been the biggest problem, because most cross-border trade is done on a hand-to-mouth basis. The majority of traders act as couriers of goods and their daily income is usually not more than $5 (less than R40).
The lower class of traders, also known as day trippers, mostly carry their wares on bicycles, wheelÂbarrows or on their heads and are categorised by a daily income that’s not more than $10 (about R70). It is these traders who mostly live in border towns.
The middle-class traders are those whose income is measured by trip, by consignment. Their business is mostly conducted away from border areas.
The higher-class cross-border traders, whose income is also measured by trip, by consignment, are the ones able to import and use trade protocols to maximise their profits — but corruption plays a negative role for them: their goods may be detained for no apparent reason.
The financial system in the SADC region does not favour small-scale cross-border traders. In addition to a mobile, dangerous workplace on buses and trucks and at border points, the issue of collateral asked for by financial institutions before they give a trader a loan, has negated their growth.
Tadeo Taruvinga is the president of the Southern Africa Cross Border Traders’ Association
The Cross-border problem
”When crossing from Zimbabwe to South Africa, the border control officials ask for an extra page on your passport,” said Tadeo Taruvinga, president of the Southern Africa Cross Border Traders’ Association and member of the Zambian ministry’s trade facilitation committee.
Taruvinga, who was speaking at the latest Mail & Guardian Critical Thinking Forum debate at Atlas Studios in Milpark last week, cited corruption at African border posts and within African governments as the biggest challenge facing informal cross-border traders such as himself.
The debate, which focused on regional trade integration, gave members of government, business and civil society an opportunity to participate the discussion.
Experts say informal cross-border trading, in which women are the main traders, has the potential to alleviate poverty in the region. But, said Taruvinga, corruption is destroying business.
”It so bad that people have been eaten by crocodiles while [attempting] to cross rivers with their goods,” instead of standing in long queues, paying mammoth bribes or filling in the extensive paperwork required at the border post.
Although Southern African leaders declared the Southern African Development Community (SADC) a free-trade area last year, the question still remains: can trade integration in the region actually work?
”Integration can work if there is a proactive approach,” said Lolette van Niekerk, a regional integration and trade adviser at the United Kingdom’s department of international development for Southern Africa. High trading costs are ”what keeps traders in the informal system”, she said.
Former SADC executive secretary Prega Ramsamy agreed.
”The SADC region presents a fragmented trading market with more than 200-million people,” Ramsamy said, adding that a conducive trade environment was essential for integration to see the light of day.
”For example, customs officials should be trained to tell the people what they are allowed to bring into the various countries.”
Rose Nkosi, an informal trader sitting in the audience, echoed the sentiments of most of the other informal traders present at the debate — and put forward perhaps one of the most urgent issues that stakeholders need to address.
”We need someone to tell us how we are supported as informal traders because we are not aware,” Nkosi said. — Mail & Guardian reporter