Home      Back to 2nd StreetNet Congress 2007

Newsletter             French    Spanish

World Social Forum 2005 and Sao Paulo visit

by Pat Horn, StreetNet Co-ordinator    

A StreetNet delegation brought some visibility and representation of street vendor organisations into the midst of the World Social Forum 2005 in Porto Allegro, Brasil, held between 26th-31st January, 2005. The World Social forum has been held since 2001 under the banner "Another world is Possible". 

The StreetNet delegation comprised the StreetNet Co-ordinator, Pat Horn, and two representatives from affiliated organisations: Fundile Jalile (Eastern Cape Alliance of Street Traders, South Africa) and Albertina Simango (ASSOTSI, Mozambique). 

StreetNet organised a panel discussion on 30th January on “The situation of street vendors, informal market vendors and hawkers – giving attention to the situation of women hawkers and vendors – and opportunities for co-operation with municipal workers and their unions in relation to local governments”. The following participants contributed at the event:

  • Fundile Jalile on the situation of street vendors and hawkers in the Eastern Cape, South Africa, the experience of his organisation and negotiations with the municipalities of Umtata and Buffalo City; 

  • Albertina Simango on the situation of street vendors and informal market vendors in Mocambique, the experience of ASSOTSI and their negotiations with the municipality of Maputo;

  • Adenilton Mendes de Brito (SINTEIN) on the situation of street vendors in Sao Paulo, the experience of SINTEIN and their negotiations with the municipality;

  • Jorge Yabkowski (PSI) on the importance of national trade union centres, including unions of street vendors and other workers in the informal economy among their affiliates, and the possibilities of co-operation between street vendors’ organisations and municipal workers’ unions in negotiating with municipalities.

A series of events was organised by the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU), the World Congress of Labour (WCL), ETUC, Solidar, Social Alert and Global Progressive Forum that put the spotlight on the “The Social Dimension of Globalisation”. 

Pat Horn took part in a panel discussion in this series on “the Informal Economy” on the 29th January, along with Lameck Kashiwa of Zambia, Plamen Dimitrov of Bulgaria, Abdelkhader Azrai of Morocco, Angelique Kipulu of the Democratic Republic of the Congo,  Aminata Traore of Mali, and Ieke Van Den Burg of the European Parliament. 

Visit:  Sao Paulo

In Sao Paulo, on the way back from Porto Alegre, the StreetNet delegation went to the Head Office of Brasil CUT, where we were met by members of SINTEIN (Sindicato dos Trabalhadores na Economia Informal) and of the International and Organising departments of Brasil CUT. SINTEIN took us for a short tour around the informal trading area of Bras in the vicinity of the CUT offices, before Jalile and Albertina had to leave for their flights back to Umtata and Maputo. 

The next day we visited the following locations:

  • Central Municipal Market (historic building, built in 1920 and inaugurated in 1932) and adjacent informal trading area of District 25 Marco which has approximately 13 000 informal traders.

  • Central Cathedral da Se (where Workers Mass is said every 1 May) and the adjacent informal trading area of District 15 Novembro.
  • Informal trading district in the vicinity of the Metro and bus terminals of Jabaquara in Zona Sul (southern zone of Sao Paulo) to see members of SINTEIN.

On 3 February a seminar was held at the SINTEIN office, also attended by Comrade Palma of CUT about StreetNet. The question of affiliation to StreetNet was discussed – and supported by a majority vote. 

The seminar was also attended by representatives of another independent union of street vendors, SINPESP (Sindicato dos Permissionarios de Sao Paulo) with which CUT has established some level of co-operation. SINPESP is a union of street vendors with permits, that is, affiliated to the Chamber of Commerce. However, the permits of their members are precarious, and can be easily taken away. In practice, they cannot really confine their work only to vendors with trade permits. SINPESP participates in negotiating forums, alongside SINTEIN and other unions and associations (such as the disabled vendors union and the shop owners’ associations) with the Sao Paulo municipality at district level. These are statutory forums called Comissoes Permanentes de Ambulantes (CPAs).

We also visited the SINPESP offices in Santana dictrict (Zona Norte) and in Santo Amaro district (Zona Sul) and toured the surrounding street vendor areas. Santo Amaro is an area with many syndicates – where assassinations have taken place around conflicts over space and influence. 

We visited week-end markets in the Japanese area of Sao Paulo and Praca de Republica (central Sao Paulo). The vendors have to have special permits to work in these markets too. 

On Monday 7th February, we went to the SINTEIN offices to complete formalities for SINTEIN’s application for affiliation to StreetNet, and I was able to bring their affiliation application back with me.

Home

Newsletter