Women vendors earn more than
paid workers
INFORMAL sector women selling goods on roadsides in rural Madang province earn an average income three times the minimum wage and are better off than many formal sector employees, according to a recent study.
The relative success of these roadside sellers relies to a large extent on access to good quality customary land and proximity to major roads, according to Tim Anderson, a lecturer in the department of political economic at the University of Sydney.
Writing in the latest issue of Pacific Economic Journal, published by the Australian National University, Mr Anderson said a survey he did in December 2006 showed these workers had an average weekly income of K286.
However, when he took account of differences between various markets the weighted average was around K138.
This was “almost identical” to a similar study in 2003 conducted by the National Research Institute of informal sector incomes in Central, East New Britain, Morobe and Western Highlands provinces.
Mr Anderson noted that the minimum wage was K37.20 a week. “Workers at Madang’s RD Tuna factory – who are overwhelmingly women – are paid at or below this minimum: just 85 toea an hour which, in a 46 to 47-hour working week could amount to K40.
“The mainly male workers at Ramu Sugar’s new oil palm plantation were paid more: K1.05 an hour, though planting work was paid at piece rates.”
Although the roadside sellers only operated for an average of three days a week they had incomes that were significantly higher than formal sector wages for women and more than four times the income of women in ėMama Lus’ fruit schemes for women living in palm oil areas.
At the Watta Rais market, at the junction of the Okuk Highway, most of the vendors were earning between K1,000 and K2,000 a week.
Other high income earnings, getting more than K50 a day, “had their success through some combination of betelnut, peanut, melons and mangoes,” he said.
The main problem facing the roadside sellers was reportedly theft, especially of betelnut, by relatives, settlers and sometimes police, he wrote.
Mr Anderson said a majority of the 44 sellers in the survey, about 68%, had other sources of income.
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