CHINEY BUSINESS A KILL OUT DI RES A BUSINESS DEM INA ST ANN

Brown’s Town merchants say Chinese businesses ‘killing’ them

Romaine Jackson (left) and his cousin Junior Williams speak of the impact of Asian-operated business on the family-run supermarket. (Kenyon Hemans)

Local merchants in Brown’s Town, St Ann believe the growth of Chinese-operated businesses is slowly crippling the success of Jamaican-run entities.

In our visit last week to the community, there were over 20 Chinese-operated establishments which, according to local merchants, have caused a decline in their sales.

“If you should go around Brown’s Town, when I started working in Brown’s Town there was no Chinese here and right now is just the two of us as black men — me and the man across the street,” a man who identified himself only as Lynch stated.

His 12-year-old supermarket has only stayed afloat because of what he described as his loyal customers.

“It’s impacted the business tremendously and I don’t know how dem get fi dem goods. I don’t know how dem do it, but you cannot compete with them,” Lynch told the Jamaica Observer.

“I must be honest with you, I can’t compete with their prices … what they do I don’t know,” he added.

He said that before the increase of Asian businesses roughly five years ago, “mainly Jamaicans operated businesses in Brown’s Town”.

But, according to him, over time the Chinese bought out those businesses.

“That building was here for about 100 years, from generation to generation, an’ di man come sell it out. Of course, there is one right across there, right at the roundabout there, it was a black man own it and they sell it to the Chinese,” he said.

When asked why the Jamaicans were selling their businesses, he suggested that money was at the root of it.

“Is quick money. They can get the money, the Chinese give them any money for it, so any money they ask for the Chinese give them.”

Lynch described the Chinese merchants as “brazen”, noting that they proposition him daily in a attempt to get him to relinquish his business to them.

He recalled one particular exchange.

“Last month one called me, ‘Would you rent me di business?’ he said mimicking the Chinese accent. “I said how much you would give me for it, and him give me one ridiculous price,” he continued, disclosing that he declined the offer.

Though he recognised that the Jamaican operators were partly to blame for the increase, Lynch maintained that the Government was also at fault.

“There’s a concessionary thing that the Government give to them. I don’t know if is five years tax-free or what. Now, when that is finished, after the five years, enuh, is the same relative come and take it over enuh, so they just change di name an they go on, go on like that,” he said.

Lynch suggested that Jamaican operators needed to unite as well as the Chinese to be able to combat the prices.

“Well, the only solution is that all the black business places have to come together and work together, because what they really do, enuh, is to work together. The reason why they can sell their things so cheap is because they get together, buy it in bulk and able to sell it back at a reasonable price. But we are not that together so that we can do that. We need to do sumn like that,” he said.

“Look here, we have a Chinese man down the bottom there that we buy from…an di same Grace things that you buy from Grace you can get it from him cheaper because he goes and buys like three or four trailer loads of one sumn an den dem distribute it among themselves,” Lynch said.

Another local merchant, Romaine Jackson, whose family has operated businesses in Brown’s Town for roughly seven years, told the

Sunday Observer it has been challenging to maintain the business.

“It’s a real challenge for us Jamaicans to actually maintain a business when a Chinese or Asian is coming in and selling the same thing, and they can sell the product at say five dollars because their tax rate is far different from ours and we have to sell it for like seven dollars ‘cause we have to make a profit, because when them deduct the tax out of it, it nuh really make any sense,” he reasoned.

“So we can’t do it the same way them do it, and people say ‘your prices too dear an’ we cyaa buy from you an’ dem more fi go buy from them,” he continued.

When the Sunday Observer visited the town, the team noticed that the Chinese operators managed multiple establishments, usually in close proximity to each other. They all declined to speak with theis newspaper.

“Well it started back from seven years still; dem start come in nuff. But since 2015 they have been increasing even more, because if you look across the road, that will be a supermarket very soon and will pose some problems,” the supermarket operator said.

“Dem a dominate Brown’s Town, now ‘cause if you check the streets, dem populated with more Chinese and them all connected, if you check it out all a dem a family. Right now dem dominate Brown’s Town you can count the number of black people who operate business in Brown’s Town,” he added.

His cousin, Junior Williams, reasoned that the growth of Asian-operated businesses is as a result of the difference in how Jamaicans are educated.

“We are not being taught to be business people. We are in this sort of brainwashed mentality where we think to go to the highest to work for somebody, not to go to the highest to be your own boss and entrepreneurs,” he stated.

“It’s not just Jamaica, it’s everywhere.”

He, like his cousin, noted that the increase has a negative impact on the family’s supermarket.

“What we get as customers for the day, them maybe a get that inna 20 minutes or half an hour,” said Williams. “So business tends to be dying out for black people. Everybody that’s coming up aren’t coming up to be managers and owners and carry on family heritage, carry on family businesses.”

“It is killing us slowly, but surely.”