– as City Council continues sanitisation

By Telesha Ramnarine

THE Bourda Market, in Georgetown, will be closed today (Wednesday) to facilitate the cleaning and sanitising of the entire market and its environs, in an initiative described by city officials as important and necessary.

With Thursday being declared a national holiday, this move can prove costly to the vendors, as it means that they will be out of business for two days in a row, but the decision to sanitise this market was reportedly made weeks ago.

The Markets Department of the Mayor and City Council (M&CC), therefore, went ahead with its schedule, and issued notices to all of the vendors in and around the market, so that they could have been made aware that no vending is allowed today.

Chairman of the Markets and Public Health Committee at City Hall, Heston Bostwick told this publication on Tuesday that with the Stabroek and Albouystown Markets already being sanitised, it is now Bourda’s turn, and that the same will be done for the three other municipal markets in the city. There are six municipal markets in total.
According to Bostwick, the plan is to have the markets cleaned in this fashion at least every three months for now, unless more resources become available, and they can be cleaned in sooner timeframes.

Bostwick said an exercise like this is very costly to the municipality, as each time it’s done, in his estimation, it takes more than a million dollars to complete. “But it will be more costly if we don’t do it,” he observed.

According to him, the cleaning and sanitising arrangements of the markets came out of the COVID-19 taskforce that was established by Mayor Ubraj Narine, who reached out to key organisations for aid.

Head of the Solid Waste Management Department, Walter Narine offered that since 2014, this is the first time that the entire market will be washed, with help from the Guyana Fire Service.

“Not only the meat section, but the rice section, the clothing section, the entire market; Orange Walk, North Road, Alexander Street, Bourda Street, Regent Street. After that, the Public Health Section will be coming in to spray and sanitise, to ensure that rodents and stuff are cleared,” Narine informed.
The markets continue to be sanitised every week, but according to Narine, the exercise today will be a comprehensive washing and sanitising.
“Since COVID, this is the first time we are washing the entire market; it is really in bad shape. Two weeks ago, and even to today, we undertook to clean all the internal drains to ensure that when we wash tomorrow (today), no blockage and overflowing occurs.”

Head of M&CC’s Public Health Department, Suzette Reynolds-Marcus noted that Jeyes Fluid disinfectant will be used in today’s cleaning, since the market environment is mostly an outdoor one.

“There is no sure proof of what amount of viruses it kills, but so far, in our Council spaces, we are preventing the spread. If one staff is down… we are not getting a high level of it spreading throughout the organisation. If one person is infected, that person is quickly isolated, and given enough time to recuperate by themselves at home,” she explained.
According to her, some of the markets are very big, thus making it difficult for the cleaning crew to get around all the crevices. The intention, she said, is therefore to have the markets sanitised often.

Meanwhile, the City Council has said that it has established a fixed schedule to sanitise all of its buildings on a regular basis.

As for the cleaning at Bourda today, the municipality said vendors are not to keep open, operate or occupy their stalls, nor conduct any business activity on this day. “There shall be no selling in and around the market; there must be free access to the surface drains in and around the market. Also, no goods, benches nor palette should be around whilst this exercise is ongoing,” the Council urged.