Brikama fish vendors speak to Mansa Banko blog

On Wednesday 16^th March 2016, Mansa Banko blog visited the Brikama Market in the West Coast Region (WCR) to chat with the fish vendors on pertinent issues concerning their welfare vis-à-vis the market.

Brikama is also considered as one of the biggest market in the Gambia that offers and supply affordable commodities to the masses. The fish market is no exception.

“I have been a fish vendor for the past 11^th years. It is through the fishing industry that I become a successful man and I am also the bread winner of my family,” says Mr. Modou Lamin Sabally, a fish vendor at the Brikama market. 

 
He also lamented the struggle and challenges involved in fishing ranging from transportation cost, ice block shortage, and high prices of fish by the sailors and among a host of others.

“Ice block is also another challenge because many a times we use it to preserve our fish from getting spoil,” he added.

“There is no fix price for fish,  sometimes we got  it at a high price from the fishermen  but sometimes we get it at low price , we sell it the way we get it from the fishermen.”

Hamadou Daffeh, another fish vendor said he earned his living from his fishing market and pays his children’s school fees.

“I settle everything from this business and help myself and my family. I am now a successful fish seller in brikama, and I enjoy being a fish seller. My day to day activity is buying fish from the fisher men and sell it at the market,” he said.

Also speaking, Mrs. Susan SL Mendy stated that after buying the fish from the sailors, it undergoes some processes such as putting it in an ice block  while at the sea site and ‘when we come to the market  again, we have to put another ice block again so that the fish will stay long and fresh till the following day’.