Cooperative market management brings new revenue
to a community in rural Senegal

On market days, the small, southern Senegalese roadside town of Diaobé springs to chaotic life. Roving vendors wend their way through throngs of shoppers. The national highway is lined with mountains of locally grown onions and watermelons, buckets of central Senegalese peanuts and salt and barrels of bright red palm oil from Guinea-Bissau. The scent of Guinean coffee beans and dried fish permeate the air, while the braying of donkeys, goats and sheep rises up over the din of people haggling in half a dozen languages.

Diaobé increasingly plays host to a daily influx of vendors and buyers from all over the West African region, including neighboring Gambia, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau and Mali. Each week, more than 15,000 people exchange over 1,000 tons of products worth about 250 million FCFA ($450,000).

But abundance comes at a price. Vendors vie with trucks and buses for space along the highway, as there are no rules governing where people set up shop, unload their goods, discharge passengers or park. And there is no organized sanitation system. The high concentration of people and money draws thieves and prostitutes, leading to violence and disease; but the police force is not mobilized to address these issues effectively. And when night descends upon Diaobé, the whole scene is plunged into darkness, as electricity has yet to reach this poor, rural town.

Despite the market's huge economic potential, until recently Kounkané received next to nothing in the way of market taxes, vending charges or parking fees.

Anarchy, poor sanitation, security issues and paltry public revenues are not limited to the market in Diaobé. However, DGL Felo, a decentralization and local governance program of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), selected Diaobé as a pilot case for management and revenue mobilization of local markets.

Using a participatory approach, DGL Felo opened a public dialogue and brought together citizens, merchants and vendors, the police and local officials. The assembly of actors decided that the first order of business would be to increase the collection of market-related revenues.

DGL Felo helped the collectivity forge a valuable relationship with the police force, which agreed to partner with tax and fee collectors to reinforce their authority. New collectors were hired and trained, including several women for the first time in Diaobé's history, and DGL Felo outfitted them with uniforms and badges. DGL Felo provided the rural council with a computer, and trained council members to record and track market revenues using a spreadsheet program designed for that purpose. Two toll booths were installed along the highway, at the entrance and exit of the market, to ensure a systematic collection of vehicle and parking fees. Finally, local officials instituted procedures to carefully monitor the performance of each collector, thereby guarding against fraud.

As of August 2003, the collectivity had already collected 8,026,950 FCFA ($14,000) in market revenues for the year, reflecting an average monthly income of 1 million FCFA ($1,785) - more than four times the average monthly amount collected in 2002 (238,933 FCFA or $427). The boost in market revenues has helped the collectivity invest in new market stalls and three community schools.

A major factor in the increased revenues has been a shift in people's attitudes toward paying their market taxes and fees, brought about by public participation and changes in the collection process. Whereas many merchants and vendors were once suspicious of market collectors, they feel more comfortable paying the new, uniformed collectors who operate in an organized, transparent manner.

"I was not the only one who was skeptical of USAID's program at first," said Ibrahima Diallo, a vendor and elected leader of a working committees. "There have been many efforts to fix the problems at Diaobé, and everyone becomes overwhelmed and gives up. However, the new, systematic approach of DGL Felo charmed the population."

Now that there is regular communication between the population and their elected officials, many more local merchants are confident that they will have a say in how the collectivity's proceeds are spent.

The USAID-supported initiative to improve the organization and management of the Diaobé market will continue through 2004. Although there are still many hurdles to clear on the road to a well-organized, healthy and safe public market, Diaobé at last has the financial momentum, popular participation and management structures in place to succeed.