Haitian migrants are developing their own survival economy on Mexico's southern border, working in informal trade, aided by remittances they receive from relatives in the United States.

Hundreds of Haitians have been staying for the past few weeks in the central park of Tapachula, on the border with Guatemala, where they engage in informal trade in products while waiting for the National Institute for Migration (INM) grant them (after long months of waiting) of cards for humanitarian reasons. These informal activities, which they often carry out 8 to 12 hours a day, allow them to meet their needs to pay the rent, services and food for their family...

Groups of Haitian migrants settle behind the market of Sebastián Escobar (Tapachula) selling, among other things, food, clothing, shoes, sweets, vegetables, cell phone items and other plastic objects, or exchanging currencies, while many others cut hair or shine shoes...

Sergio Motaña is a fellow Haitian who has sold everything from cell phone chips, dollars, soft drinks and even food "for me it's a very nice place [Tapachula], there are a lot of good people who have helped us, but the migration is very difficult. To get the paper out so we can get out of here, to travel to another place, it's kinda hard to get the permit, so we're here waiting to survive...

However, this informal and illegal trade does not take place without difficulty, operations of the Mexican forces (National Guard and municipal police) sometimes intervene to prevent hundreds of Haitian migrants from establishing street businesses in Tapachula and to prevent clashes between migrants and local traders said José Arturo Rojas, secretary of public services of Tapachula who assures that the local authorities have started to relocate Haitian migrants to the "Tianguis Centro" market.

More than 200 Haitian migrants who made their sales in the central park Miguel Hidalgo and in the surrounding streets of the city center, now do so in an orderly manner in the market of "Tianguis Centro" open from 6:00 am to 9:00 pm and without cause traffic problems.

Arturo Cárdenas Rojas, the Secretary of Public Services in charge of the municipal market said "So far, the migrants have said that they feel good in this space where the authorities have relocated them, because it has the necessary services to sell their products."

S/ HaitiLibre