Home » Opinion » Opinion Columns
Target chengguan in the fight against soaring food prices
By Wan Lixin |
November 26, 2010, Friday
|
Print Edition
Print Edition
SOARING food prices have recently provoked some desperate remedies on the part of the government.
Tolls and fees levied on vegetables have been reduced or exempted. The effect is instantaneous.
For the time being the government seems to have temporarily suspended its faith in the market. But could these measures be a long-term solution, or are they just expedients?
For how long will chengguan (urban order enforcers) be happy with fee reductions or exemptions? Chengguan are powerful people known for brutally cracking down on unlicensed street vendors because this allows them to exact as much fees as possible from licensed vendors.
The existence of these enforcers explains why mainland vegetables can sell for much cheaper in Hong Kong, where selling vegetables is subsidized.
Chengguan are sometimes very cruel. The following are just two recent examples.
Lost finger
On November 9, a 76-year-old vegetable seller drove a donkey cart eight hours to Zhengzhou to sell sweet potatoes and carrots in the capital city of Henan Province. He was trying to earn some money to buy medicine for his son, who became paralyzed two years ago.
Almost immediately after starting to sell the produce, a law-enforcement car pulled up. A 40-year-old man got out of the car, approached the vendor and started throwing away the sweet potatoes and carrots. When the hunchbacked Zhang tried to intervene, the man turned to him and began to repeatedly slap the vendor in the face. The attack was so violent that Zhang's cap flew off.
A separate incident occurred the next day in Gaochun County, Jiangsu Province, when 63-year-old villager Qing Chunsheng rode a pedicab to sell some home-grown vegetables outside a market. A chengguan tried to seize her steelyard and in the ensuing scuffle, a segment of Qing's finger was pulled off.
Vendors typically flee in all directions when they see these enforcers approaching. But these two elderly citizens were probably too old to make a timely retreat.
On October 20, the Indian Supreme Court, asserting vendors' fundamental right to carry on their business, demanded that Indian Parliament enact comprehensive legislation to protect and promote livelihoods of more than 10 million street vendors.
India has often been cited as an example to throw into relief the China miracle - China's powerful bulldozers, the dazzling neon lights, the absence of slums and squalor, or the towering high-rises.
But what do neon lights and over-sanitized streets have to do with you and me, if you are not an official thirsty for promotion? Are they more real than the subsistence of millions of thousands of people who have to eke out a living by honest labor?
Brutish behavior
It is opined that the spiritual state of a country can be determined by what is happening on the streets. As Xiong Peiyun commented in an article last year, streets exist for the real needs of the residents, not for the mania of a state or city to conjure up a dazzling spectacle.
The brutish behavior of chengguan makes me think of a 12th-century painting which depicts the energy and prosperity of Kaifeng, in today's Henan Province.
An electric version of Zhang Zeduan's painting "Qingming Shanghe Tu" or "Along the River in the Qingming Festival" was displayed at the World Expo in Shanghai.
But there was also a PS version of the masterpiece circulating online, a version called "The chengguan is coming!" In this version, all the vendors, big and small, are fleeing the scene, leaving behind a few desolated houses, and a mess of litter and overturned carts.
I also think of a photo of a small restaurant keeper in a park near Dianchi Lake in Kunming, Yunnan Province. It was taken in 1945 by Allen Larsen, a member of the 1st American Volunteer Group, also known as the Flying Tigers. A young man, dressed immaculately and radiating health, satisfaction and confidence, stands beside a table covered with dishes and set with several beautiful flowers.
Could he maintain such poise and elegance if he had to look out for chengguan?
Tolls and fees levied on vegetables have been reduced or exempted. The effect is instantaneous.
For the time being the government seems to have temporarily suspended its faith in the market. But could these measures be a long-term solution, or are they just expedients?
For how long will chengguan (urban order enforcers) be happy with fee reductions or exemptions? Chengguan are powerful people known for brutally cracking down on unlicensed street vendors because this allows them to exact as much fees as possible from licensed vendors.
The existence of these enforcers explains why mainland vegetables can sell for much cheaper in Hong Kong, where selling vegetables is subsidized.
Chengguan are sometimes very cruel. The following are just two recent examples.
Lost finger
On November 9, a 76-year-old vegetable seller drove a donkey cart eight hours to Zhengzhou to sell sweet potatoes and carrots in the capital city of Henan Province. He was trying to earn some money to buy medicine for his son, who became paralyzed two years ago.
Almost immediately after starting to sell the produce, a law-enforcement car pulled up. A 40-year-old man got out of the car, approached the vendor and started throwing away the sweet potatoes and carrots. When the hunchbacked Zhang tried to intervene, the man turned to him and began to repeatedly slap the vendor in the face. The attack was so violent that Zhang's cap flew off.
A separate incident occurred the next day in Gaochun County, Jiangsu Province, when 63-year-old villager Qing Chunsheng rode a pedicab to sell some home-grown vegetables outside a market. A chengguan tried to seize her steelyard and in the ensuing scuffle, a segment of Qing's finger was pulled off.
Vendors typically flee in all directions when they see these enforcers approaching. But these two elderly citizens were probably too old to make a timely retreat.
On October 20, the Indian Supreme Court, asserting vendors' fundamental right to carry on their business, demanded that Indian Parliament enact comprehensive legislation to protect and promote livelihoods of more than 10 million street vendors.
India has often been cited as an example to throw into relief the China miracle - China's powerful bulldozers, the dazzling neon lights, the absence of slums and squalor, or the towering high-rises.
But what do neon lights and over-sanitized streets have to do with you and me, if you are not an official thirsty for promotion? Are they more real than the subsistence of millions of thousands of people who have to eke out a living by honest labor?
Brutish behavior
It is opined that the spiritual state of a country can be determined by what is happening on the streets. As Xiong Peiyun commented in an article last year, streets exist for the real needs of the residents, not for the mania of a state or city to conjure up a dazzling spectacle.
The brutish behavior of chengguan makes me think of a 12th-century painting which depicts the energy and prosperity of Kaifeng, in today's Henan Province.
An electric version of Zhang Zeduan's painting "Qingming Shanghe Tu" or "Along the River in the Qingming Festival" was displayed at the World Expo in Shanghai.
But there was also a PS version of the masterpiece circulating online, a version called "The chengguan is coming!" In this version, all the vendors, big and small, are fleeing the scene, leaving behind a few desolated houses, and a mess of litter and overturned carts.
I also think of a photo of a small restaurant keeper in a park near Dianchi Lake in Kunming, Yunnan Province. It was taken in 1945 by Allen Larsen, a member of the 1st American Volunteer Group, also known as the Flying Tigers. A young man, dressed immaculately and radiating health, satisfaction and confidence, stands beside a table covered with dishes and set with several beautiful flowers.
Could he maintain such poise and elegance if he had to look out for chengguan?
- About Us
- |
- Terms of Use
- |
-
RSS - |
- Privacy Policy
- |
- Contact Us
- |
- Shanghai Call Center: 962288
- |
- Tip-off hotline: 52920043
- 沪ICP证：沪ICP备05050403号-1
- |
- 互联网新闻信息服务许可证：31120180004
- |
- 网络视听许可证：0909346
- |
- 广播电视节目制作许可证：沪字第354号
- |
- 增值电信业务经营许可证：沪B2-20120012
Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.
