Street vending flourishes as a livelihood in Kinshasa

From sunrise to sunset, street vendors move along Kinshasa’s main avenues, carrying everyday goods and searching for customers. They sell bottled or bagged water, bread, sausages, doughnuts, peanuts, eggs, vegetables, flour and other basic products.

Some vendors use prerecorded advertisements through megaphones. Others call out the names of their goods themselves. Without permanent stalls, they travel from house to house, visit bars and walk along the capital’s busiest roads, sometimes weaving through heavy traffic.

For the vendors interviewed by Radio Okapi, this small-scale trade is their main source of income. Some use it to support their families and pay their children’s school fees. Others say it offers an alternative to idleness and helps keep them away from theft or begging.

One vendor who sells bread and sausages said he had worked in the trade for more than 20 years. He said it had allowed him to support his family and educate his children. Younger vendors acknowledged the difficulties but said the work remained preferable to inactivity while job opportunities remained limited.

“When we earn our own money, we are not tempted to steal or hold out our hands in the streets, as is unfortunately the case for some young people in Kinshasa,” one vendor said. For them, street trading is more than subsistence. It offers autonomy, dignity and a way to take part in society amid unemployment and economic insecurity.

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When we earn our own money, we are not tempted to steal or hold out our hands in the streets, as is unfortunately the case for some young people in Kinshasa.