Tue, Aug 13, 2024 page8

• EDITORIAL: Policies can help street vendors

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  Nvidia Corp chief executive officer Jensen Huang’s (黃仁勳) love for night markets is well known in Taiwan, as he has frequented many during his visits to Taipei last year and earlier this year, which dominated local news headlines.

  During the Computex trade show in May, Huang even invited Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co founder Morris Chang (張忠謀) and Quanta Computer Inc chairman Barry Lam (林百里) to visit Taipei’s Ningxia Night Market with him, which also attracted much media coverage and attention to Taiwan’s street vendor culture.

  Coincidentally, on the same day that the technology tycoons visited Ningxia Night Market, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) released a street vendor survey, which showed that as of June last year, there were 233,000 street vendors in Taiwan, decreasing by 74,000, or 23.95 percent, from August 2018.

  The report found that the largest reduction was in night markets, where the number of snack, food and beverage vendors had dropped by nearly 40,000 during the past five years, a phenomenon not seen since the DGBAS’ first survey conducted in 1988.

  The survey showed that street vendors provided 118,000 fewer employment opportunities in the past five years, leaving only 357,000 as of June last year. Although there were fewer snack, food and beverage stalls in night markets, these types of vendors still accounted for 53.61 percent of the total street vendors in Taiwan, at 125,000, and employed about 200,000 people as of June last year.

  Overall, street vendors create significant job opportunities and contribute a lot to social stability, but they have also struggled to maintain their businesses over those years, the survey indicated.

  For instance, street vendors’ revenue fell 26.71 percent to NT$395.4 billion (US$12.181 billion) as of June last year, compared with August 2018, according to the survey. On average, annual revenue per street venue was NT$1.69 million and NT$533,000 in profit, which were also down 3.64 percent and 7.3 percent respectively from five years ago, the survey found.

  The findings showed that street vendors across Taiwan are in a difficult situation, which the DGBAS attributed to a decline in tourists and a shift in consumer habits during the COVID-19 pandemic as delivery services and online shopping became more popular.

  Some vendors have transformed their businesses by setting up street-front shops, some have set up online platforms to offset the cost of running a physical stall, and some have just closed down due to aging, all of which have contributed to the decrease in the number of vendors.

  However, a more positive note is that street vendors are increasingly digitizing their operations. The DGBAS survey found that 26,190 street vendors provided business information through the Internet as of June last year, with 9,941 offering mobile payment services and 8,974 also conducting their business online.

  Nonetheless, street vendors are a grassroots local culture and a thermometer for the health of the local economy. They would continue to exist albeit as a smaller proportion of the economy as it evolves, but are likely to face constant challenges to attract customers, especially in terms of the value for money, the diversity of products and the flexibility in purchasing.

  Therefore, street vendors must work hard to win consumers’ trust, become their preference and make their products more attractive.

  Government support measures must also be put in place to enhance vendors’ competitiveness and support a high level of consumer satisfaction that can eventually improve vendors’ well-being and the local economy as a whole.
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