THE MOBILE STREET FOOD SERVICE PRACTICE IN THE URBAN ECONOMY OF KUMBA, CAMEROON Cletus Acho-Chi Department of Geography, University of Buea, Buea, Cameroon ABSTRACT The mobile food service practice is one of multiple survival strategies adopted by poor urban households in Cameroon to maintain and expand the base of subsistence incomes, especially in the current surge of economic crisis. Though a fast-growing informal sector enterprise, it is still at an artisanal stage in urban Cameroon, creating an urgent need for a supportive policy environment that could have measurable positive impacts on improving the productivity, welfare and income levels of the micro-entrepreneurs. This study looks at the mobile food service practice in Kumba, Cameroon, in terms of its basic characteristics, the locational factors influencing its socio-spatial distribution, the critical success factors (CSFs) determining customer choices, and its impacts on the local environmental resources and quality of urban life. The mobile food service practice creates employment, generates income, and acts as a food energy-support instrument to the urban poor and local economic activities operating in Kumba. The vendors, who are mostly women, can make incomes that are 405 per cent of the national minimum wage and, thus, contribute financially towards the education, health and survival of their families. The paper provides some recommendations on ways to improve the efficiency of this sector so as to achieve sustainable economic and social development and to enhance empowerment thereof. Keywords: informal sector economy, micro-finance schemes, women entrepreneurs, mobile food vending, central place location, Cameroon BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES Many studies have been undertaken on as the cornerstone of urban growth, expansion urbanisation, urban activities and functions, and development, given official recognition the interaction and interdependence of with recorded and measured indicators of gross activities of urban dwellers, and urban areas domestic product (GDP). In contrast, the non- as market centres. Urban areas are magnets for basic, local or population serving sector lacks industrial, manufacturing and resource- official recognition and includes unregulated oriented companies (like logging and mining) and unmeasured components (Anita & or basic sector firms, whose fortunes depend McDade, 1998). This informal sector, sometimes largely upon non-local factors (Johnson, 1972). regarded as an undesirable “retarded” sector The basic sector produces goods for export, with low productivity and a drag on economic fetches income earned elsewhere and is seen growth (Juma et al., 1993), has also been Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography, 23(2), 2002, 131-148 Copyright 2002 Department of Geography, National University of Singapore and Blackwell Publishers Ltd Acho-Chi.p65 3 6/1/2002, 11:56 AM 132 Acho-Chi acknowledged as important in providing (EPOC), a small think tank in Washington, D.C., employment, services and goods (Hart, 1973; addressing the specific needs and concerns of Cornia et al., 1992) through economic activities women in international development circles. that depend largely upon local selling This orientation is clear in her book, Street conditions. Foods: Urban Food and Development in Developing Countries (Tinker, 1997), the first The mobile food service trade is an detailed empirical study of those who make, sell important component of the informal economy and consume street foods, based on 15 years in Kumba, the largest town in South West of research in the Philippines, Thailand, Province, Cameroon. It is a home-based Indonesia, Bangladesh, Egypt, Nigeria and enterprise carried out in makeshift structures Senegal. Tinker shows how cultural attitudes or stalls along the street by isolated, self- affect what foods are sold and eaten, by whom reliant individuals who meet the nutritional and when. She also refers to development needs of the urban poor. Food preparation theory and practice in relation to the economics and service occur at different sites, with the of street foods, including nutritional safety home-prepared foods transported to meet aspects, and the implications for research, clients at, often unauthorised, locations within planning and policy. The robustness of the the urban area that constitutes the spatial respective country data that allow comparisons market. In urban Kumba, the mobile street food of similarities and differences among street service system enjoys a wide spatial vendors, including demographic and gender distribution. The concentration of mobile food variations, like other feminist investigations, are sellers is highest in the central business district used to frame an action agenda. Tinker’s (CBD), and the network distance between any studies, showing the significant economic, two food service points varies from 5 m in the cultural and nutritional benefits of street foods, CBD to 500 m in the suburban zone and 1,000 have helped to change the policies and practices m in the peri-urban area. of municipal and national governments and the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO). In This case study broadly examines the many of the study cities, local officials no longer socio-spatial distribution and economic and harass or hit upon street food operators but environmental impacts of the mobile food provide education about food safety and service system in Kumba. It specifically seeks vendor health. to: (i) identify the basic characteristics of the mobile food service micro-enterprise; (ii) Also pertinent in this respect is the work of discern the locational factors of this non-basic the International Alliance of Street Vendors, sector; (iii) highlight the impacts of the mobile founded in 1995 by groups of activists from food service system on the quality of urban 11 countries to promote and protect the rights life; and (iv) recommend some planning and of street vendors. Its focal point of action is design guidelines for improving productivity the 1995 Bellagio International Declaration in the context of poverty alleviation and which sets forth a plan to create national sustainable urban development. policies and calls for action at four levels, namely, by individual traders, traders’ LITERATURE REVIEW associations, city governments and inter- national organisations, including the United Most street food enterprises are operated by a Nations, International Labour Organisation single, usually female, vendor or a couple, with (ILO), and World Bank. A long-term objective no employees, but entailing considerable of the Alliance is to build a case and mobilise unpaid family labour. In 1978, Irene Tinker, a support for an international strategy such as feminist pioneer in the field of international an ILO convention on the rights and needs of development, founded the Equity Policy Center street food vendors. Acho-Chi.p65 4 6/1/2002, 11:56 AM Mobile Street Food Service Practice in Cameroon 133 Other specific writings on the street food households change their economic behaviour trade include Winarno (1990), Wood (1990), in order to limit the damage to their welfare. Saito (1991), Bapat (1992), Mosse (1993), Survival strategies generally involve Downing (1995) and Solo (1998). Winarno and generating additional income or reducing Allain (1991) pull together the current benefits household overheads at the expense of non- of the street food trade to demonstrate that financial aspects of welfare, such as household street food entrepreneurial activities use local time, conducive living and working environ- resources and markets, provide vendors with ments, family unity and integrity of the local satisfactory earnings and customers access communities. Accordingly, community to inexpensive, varied and nutritious foods. support mechanisms form an extremely On the other hand, the problems and important informal redistributive and social constraints faced include harassment by local security system in containing the negative officials; contamination from unsanitary effects of adverse economic development on practices; lack of credit, recognition and legal low-income households. Certainly, in many status; complex or non-existent licensing developing countries, and especially in sub- systems; ineffective and arbitrary inspections; Saharan Africa, social organisations provide and aggravated traffic congestion. In order to vital financial, material, moral, and other forms protect public interest and meet social needs, of support to members whose socio-economic fair licensing and inspection practices conditions have been weakened by structural combined with educational drives are con- adjustment. The informal sector is conceivably sidered by urban planners and social workers the most dynamic aspect of the urban as some of the best long-term measures. development process in sub-Saharan Africa. RATIONALE FOR THE STUDY Home food preparation and sale enterprises have implications not only for the nutritional The demands of sustainable urban develop- status of urban dwellers, but also for national ment represent a daunting challenge in sub- productivity, employment, income generation Saharan Africa, including Cameroon. and urban environmental management Urbanisation, characterised by rapid concerns in Cameroon, as elsewhere. Hence, population growth and widespread poverty, the interventions by governments aimed at has led to a heavy reliance on the informal regulation. For instance, in Trinidad, this sector in most built-up areas. Urban poverty