As the mercury of the highland tourist hub of Sa Pa approaches zero, child street vendors of ethnic minorities were still seen roaming through the shivering cold to pursue the remaining tourists.
Despite the effort of Sa Pa authorities to discourage purchasing goods from child street vendors, children of the upland city, the majority being Hmong, are still pushed to the streets to peddle in the cold.
According to Ngoc Anh from the Sa Pa Town law enforcement, families seem to have cooperated and keep their children home after discussing with local authorities, but there is still a street vending group harassing tourists in the town.
The group is organized by parents who gather their kids at specific spots and let the bigger children carry the smaller ones on their back to take advantage of tourists’ pity.
If a tourist buys from one of them, the others will quickly swarm around and paster them to purchase more.
“We have imposed a penalty on many cases and led the kids to a social support center, but they jump the wall to escape and resume vending jobs the very next day,” Anh said.
The sight of children braving the cold to sell souvenirs is too heart-wrenching, said Tran Thinh, a tourist from Ho Chi Minh City.
“I can do charity work at other places, not just situations like these. The parents are using these kids to sell stuff, which makes me feel like my goodwill is being abused,” Thinh remarked.
Hoang Thi Vuong, head of Sa Pa’s bureau of culture and information, said local authorities have stepped in to address the issue of street vendors harassing tourists for several years, but their efforts have not paid off.
According to Vuong, officials in the town have implemented a long-term strategy, with the promotion of sustainable business practices to ethnic minority communities being the bottom line.
“We are listening to the wishes of each household. If they want to do retail, we will provide them with locations and capacity training. We will also build policy to support other households who wish to get livelihoods from brocade weaving, artisanal crafts, and tourism,” Vuong revealed.
This article was originally published in Tienphongnews
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Source: Vietnam Insider