May 12, 2004
By Ndaba Dlamini
IT'S early Wednesday morning and the activity at the Johannesburg Fresh Produce Market, known as Africa's biggest, can only be compared to the frantic commotion of an anthill just before the rain.
Huge trucks painted with bright pictures of fruit and vegetables roar through the gates of the market, anxious to get to the halls before their stuff is declared redundant by the fastidious market fruit and vegetable agents waiting to receive their goods.
The trucks, laden with produce fresh from farms from all over South Africa - from Tzaneen to Cape Town - dwarf the bakkies also competing for a share of the 63 hectares of market space.
Hawkers and individual customers on foot, in a frenzy to get the best grade and the freshest fruit and vegetables, jostle for space through the narrow passageway leading into the market entrance. At the entrance, market guards search every one of them for "insimbi" (fire arms) before they are released into the market grounds.
Curses for the "unnecessary delay" are commonplace, as buyers race for time around thousands of metres of floor space of three halls in search of the best fresh products.
The three halls - painted bright green - comprise the Vegetable Hall, Fruit Hall and Potato Hall, the heart of the market. While trucks from the farms offload vegetables and fruit into the halls, porters, whom one can hire to transport purchased goods, push laden trolleys from the halls towards bakkies of all shapes and sizes waiting outside to carry wares to destinations all over Gauteng and beyond.
Overlooking the halls is a multi-storey building where all administrative business is done and where those short of money can access bank services. Guards, perched on the first floor ledge, keep surveillance over proceedings.
The busiest hall is the Vegetable Hall, divided into partitions for different agencies and stacked high with all manner of vegetable products. An organised din emanates as market agents negotiate prices with farmers. The agent has to make sure he gets the best commodity from the farmer because his profits depend on sold products. If customers don't buy the commodity, he won't get the five percent to 7.5 percent commission negotiable between the producer and the agent.
A sweet, fruit-salad aroma fills the Fruit Hall. Seasonal oranges and apples are in abundance, dotted with a few boxes of lower-grade grapes, which are at the end of their season. "Apples are not attracting the highest prices at the moment," says the hall manager Philip Jooste. "The more of a particular product we get, the lower the price the product will attract because of over-supply."
Buyers from as far afield as Botswana and Zimbabwe also frequent the market. "We cater for the individual buyer to the big departmental stores and fresh produce markets in neighbouring countries," says Jooste. "We are the biggest suppliers of fresh fruit in the region."
The Potato Hall has a dark, forbidding interior with a less tantalising aroma than the Fruit or Vegetable Halls. But business is brisk as buyers concentrate more on quality than aesthetics.
The Potato Hall has to be kept dark because of the potatoes' sensitivity to light. "They turn green when exposed to light and that brings their quality down", says Hall manager Charles Park. "Onions smell and like potatoes, they are 'dirt vegetables', that is why we have to separate them from other vegetables."
Nestling at a corner to the right-hand side of the entrance to the market is the Mandela People's Market, an informal traders' bazaar where smaller quantities of produce are sold to the public. The People's Market isn't as bustling as the main market as it attracts a more diverse individual clientele.
Outside the halls, buyers wait beside their piles of purchases and porters hover in wait of prospective customers from as far as Vereeniging and Witbank.
"I wake up at around four in the morning to catch the earliest taxi to Joburg," a hawker from Tembisa on the East Rand said. "Now I have to find a bakkie owner who will charge a reasonable fee to transport me and my goods back home."
Most hawkers have regular transporters and hawkers from Johannesburg's inner city can either take a taxi back to town or hire a private car. A somewhat harrowing experience, the jam-packed 5km-plus taxi ride to town requires a loading fee which covers the number of boxes per seat, plus the seat fee for the owner.
By 10am the main activity in the market is over and porters lean exhausted against their trolleys, counting their day's takings, and charging their energy for the following morning's business.
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