01/25/2022 | Press release | Distributed by Public on 01/25/2022 16:44
If you walk through the Duala Market, the largest and most popular wholesale market in Monrovia, Liberia, in the morning, you will see vehicles crowding the streets and shopkeepers setting up their stalls. The shops spill out of the cluster of buildings that once formed the entire market and into the street for a kilometer-and-a-half stretch. Since its founding, the market has expanded to nearly 12 times its original size.
Aerial view of heavy traffic and crowding on the streets around the Duala MarketBy midday, the market is packed. Somewhere between 1,000 and 3,000 vendors sell their goods to tens of thousands of customers here, making it a hub of economic activity in Greater Monrovia. The market is a key source of food and goods for residents and of income and livelihoods for vendors from across the region.
Street-level views of the marketplaceBut in recent times, congestion and pollution have dampened the market's productivity. Crowded streets make it difficult for vendors to deliver goods, while piles of trash, clogged drains, and inadequate waste facilities discourage shoppers. To help change that, the World Bank partnered with the Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (HOT), iLab Liberia,and local stakeholders-including the government, market association, vendors, Women in Informal Employment Globalizing & Organizing (WIEGO), and others-meeting in late 2019 to explore existing sources of pollution. They focused on waste, infrastructure facilities, and food loss-and on the relationship of these factors with market productivity. The results are included in a report, Open Mapping for Productivity & Pollution Impacts on the Duala Market.
By using a new approach, combining remote-sensing data (drone-mapping, machine-learning AI, street imagery, and the like) with on-the-ground vendor surveys and focus-group discussions, researchers in this study developed a baseline dataset on the existing market infrastructure and operations; spatial and temporal flows of transport, goods, people, transactions, waste, and services; diverse stakeholder views; and much more. The project began with a multi-stakeholder workshop to promote collaboration and obtain the permits required to conduct fieldwork. Toward the end of the study, COVID-19 cases started to emerge, presenting the team with a unique opportunity to incorporate pandemic-related considerations into the analysis.
Data collection, left; the Open-Map Kit app, center; and focus-group discussion, rightHere's what the team found through data analysis:
To conclude, although the Duala market plays a critical role in Monrovia's economy, physical, institutional, and economic issues diminish its performance and productivity.
Kindly note: This study pioneered the community mapping of a combination formal/informal market in a city. Others can use the data to design interventions for local economic development and recovery in post-pandemic cities. As the data showed the Duala market to be a COVID-19 contagion hotspot, this study prompted immediate interventions by the Monrovia City Council to avoid contagion spread and to keep the market open during lockdowns. Researchers can apply the study's openly available dataset, using evidence to plan and prioritize investments in the urban environment surrounding Duala Market.