Food Consumption Patterns Part 2

102
there were vendors of both genders (the total exceeds 100% due to rounding). The most common
snacks sold were cookies (46%), crackers (30%), and peanut butter (13%), while only 1%
primarily sold popcorn. Thus, while there is only a weak formal distribution system in Haiti—as
seen in the precious chapter-- the informal distribution system is so pervasive that 1/3 rd of all
households are involved in redistribution. The reason for the extent of involvement in the snack
trade has to do with the sheer numbers of people who are poor and dependent on petty trade. As
seen at the outset of this report, 70% of the population hovers around the margin of extreme
poverty. The vast majority conduct their daily routines—production, work, trade, and purchases—
in the informal economy. But the formal economy impinges on their lives. It is the source of at
least half of all food stuffs. And when it comes to trade and distribution there is an interchange
between actors in the formal and informal market economies that offers a point of entry for saavy
minded distributors, especially those with an eye on working with the poor.
Plugging into the ‘Dueling Economies’
The formal economy is the most important entry point for manufactured products but there is a
relationship between the two that should not be overlooked and could provide a valuable tool to
make the informal economy work to the advantage of marketers of RUTFs.
In Seciton 6 it was seen that main actor in the formal economy is the komesan, the redistributor of
mostly imported goods. By virtue of his/her link to the formal economy, the komesan has greater
capital than the key actors in the informal economy, and often has access to a line of low-interest
or even interest-free credit. The key actor in the informal economy is the sara, and because she is
in the informal economy she can only access credit at exorbitant rates, as high as 23% per month.
Even in the humanitarian aid-funded credit union sector she must pay 3% to 6% per month.
Thus the komesan is able to exploit the sara by virtue of her desperation for credit. The komesan
sell their imported staples, cookies, and crackers to the madan sara on credit. The woman has 21
to 30 days to pay for the goods. If she sells it at retail market prices she stands to earn about 20%
profit, over the period of one month. If she can sell it all. Because boutik and many other women
also get the foods on credit and sell imported flour, rice, sugar, cookies and crackers out of their
homes, the products sell slowly.
So rather than wait and make a small profit, the madan sara dumps the imported foods at below
market prices so that she can get the cash and trade in domestic produce, an endeavor in which she
can earn more money, faster. The aggregate impact of what she has done is to subsidize agroindustrial
imports from developed countries (imports that were already subsidized in the countries
of origin). In other words, she is undermining her own local economy. And once again, the reason
she does it is that she is desperate for market capital.
The point here is while it seems an almost Machiavellian—but best understood as systemic and
incidental--it should not go unnoticed that sellers of high nutrition RUTFs produced with local
produce may find it justifiable—even prudent and in the best interest of both malnourished
children and local producers—to exploit this arrangement by offering madan sara RUTFs on credit
and letting them sell it as they see fit.