Ancient Mexico Facts

The containment of unruly tianguis was not the only logic behind the construction of public markets in Mexico from 1946 to 1996. Market construction also was justified as a means of supplying basic goods to urban consumers at a reasonable price. Public markets have been a standard feature of Mexican settlements since ancient times, but there were some changes in the physical structure of markets over the final decades of the twentieth century. Modern markets generally came to be made of cement and steel, many with disinfection, refrigeration, storage, child care, and meeting facilities for the sellers inside.

Public markets enhance the government’s ability to control prices of basic goods, maintain hygiene standards, and collect taxes. Vendors pay a fee to the municipal government for the right to sell, and they may also have to pay bribes to market administrators or city inspectors. Stall owners generally have an organization that sees to maintenance, utilities, the security of the building, and interactions with government officials. Markets usually follow a set pattern, with similar types of merchandise grouped together. Fruits and vegetables, and often meat, poultry, and cheese, generally appear at the center, while dry goods and prepared foods line the perimeter. Some markets specialize in one type of product, such as flowers, shoes, crafts, or clothing.

The largest markets in the country as of 1996 was La Merced in Mexico City. La Merced was actually a neighborhood network of bodegas and wholesale and retail markets covering more than 50 city blocks. At the center of the network were the Nave Mayor and Nave Menor. These markets were constructed in 1957, although the history of the site as a commercial center dates back to Mexica (Aztec) times, when the area was the terminus of a canal. The Nave Mayor of the mid-1990s was the length of four football fields laid end to end and has space for more than 3,000 stalls, most selling fresh produce. The smaller Nave Menor specialized in meats, fish, and dry goods and contained nearly 500 stalls.

Rivaling La Merced in size and importance was the Tepito neighborhood in Mexico City. The baratillo, or “hieve’s market,” moved to Tepito in the late nineteenth century. Its size and reputation grew from the 1930s to the 1960s, as repair shops proliferated along with street vendors selling used, refurbished, and sometimes stolen household items. In the 1970s Tepito became a national center for fayuca, or contraband. Although several market buildings were installed in the 1950s, in the 1990s Tepito still maintained the look and feel of an endless street bazaar, where supposedly anything and everything could be had for a price.

One of the most important traditional marketing forms in the second half of the twentieth century has been the tianguis, a market that takes place at regular intervals, usually once a week. Tianguis is a nahautl term meaning “market.” In rural areas with large indigenous populations, the tianguis was the most important place for trade among towns. Anthropologists have mapped the networks of market towns and the patterns of weekly markets in several of Mexico’s states, including Oaxaca, Michoacán, and Puebla. Their work shows a complex network of small local markets and larger regional markets. A campesino (peasant) may make regular purchases at a small weekly market in the local village (or at a small grocery store, called a miscelanea) and attend a larger regional market for bigger purchases, such as farming equipment or housewares.

The tradition of periodic markets dates back to preColombian times, but some important changes occurred in the last several decades of the twentieth century. Improvements in the road network in remote parts of the countryside meant that customers and merchants from a wider area could travel to a given market. From 1945 to 1955 the Mexican road system doubled in length, and then doubled again from 1955 to 1965. With paved roads and motor vehicles, it became possible for a merchant to appear at a different market each day of the week, even over great distances. The improvements in the rural road system brought the decline of many smaller markets in favor of larger ones.

Rural markets have a social as well as an economic function. On market day, a town of 5,000 may swell to four times that size as buyers and sellers pour in. The weekly market may be the only occasion for social contact among people who live in remote areas. People gather at the market not only to buy and sell, but also to exchange news, maintain social contacts, and often drink pulque (a fermented beverage) at a local cantina. The smaller local markets commonly take place on Sundays, allowing people to combine their purchases with attendance at church during their trip to town.

Tianguis also take place in urban areas, where they generally serve poorer neighborhoods that lack sufficient commercial outlets for the needs of the local population. Often a tianguis will become so popular that it will become an informal daily market. At this point the authorities may be forced to step in and construct a market building to bring order and improve sanitation. Although tianguis are generally tolerated in poorer neighborhoods (the federal government even initiated a program of urban farmer’s markets, called mercados sobre medas in 1969), they are officially discouraged in congested downtown areas where they can pose a traffic and waste problem.

In 1996, commerce accounted for about one-quarter of Mexico’s gross domestic product (GDP). About 13 percent of the Mexican labor force worked in retailing, and another 2 percent was employed in wholesale trading. This percentage had grown steadily since 1950, when only 9 percent of the work force was engaged in commercial activities. Two-thirds of those in the commercial sector in 1996 were employed in family businesses or very small enterprises with few employees and limited capital.

Starting in the 1940s, Mexico adopted important innovations in retailing and consumer culture while still maintaining many traditional forms of commerce. One of the more striking contrasts in Mexico’s cities in the mid-1990s was the juxtaposition of up-to-the-minute shopping malls, department stores, franchise restaurants, and supermarkets with public markets, open-air bazaars, and sidewalk vendors that appeared to be from another era. In small rural communities where traditional markets still thrived, electrical appliances, imported toys, and bottled soft drinks share space with produce, crafts, and livestock.

In the mid- 1990s the typical Mexican family shopped at a variety of locations. The principal types of locale were, first, small grocery and variety stores, specialty shops, public markets, and concentrations of street vendors; and second, supermarkets, department stores, shopping malls, and chain stores. The first group of locales date back centuries in Mexico, and in the 1990s they were still the commercial options most frequented by poorer families. The second group came to Mexico much more recently, and these stores were almost exclusively patronized by the wealthiest strata of society.

As a country develops, the purpose and function of trade changes. For poor countries, the principal concern of domestic commerce is food distribution. But as disposable income increases, retail shops modernize and diversify to meet the new demands of consumers. This pattern has been evident in Mexico since 1946. Economic growth, urbanization, and the growth of the middle class have been accompanied by the arrival of retailing models from more developed countries, such as supermarkets and shopping malls. As of 1996 this transformation was still incomplete, and traditional forms of trade and marketing remained strong, even in urban areas. In international trade, Mexico underwent a 180-degree turn over the 50 years following World War II. Whereas Mexico once embraced the theory that trade is unnecessary or even harmful to economic development, the government eventually opened its arms to international trade in the belief that trade is necessary to power economic growth. Along the way to this transformation, the type and volume of Mexico’s exports changed, reflecting the growth of some sectors of the economy, especially manufacturing and oil extraction. Mexican imports also responded to the country’s development needs, whether to feed the booming population or to supply new factories with equipment and materials.

As in ancient times, Mexico City was the hub of trade in Mexico, from 1946 to 1996, particularly in the central region of the country. Not only was Mexico City the center of railway transport, the highway system, finance, and communications in the country, it was also home to nearly one-quarter of the nation’s consumers in 1996. Forty percent of the agricultural products consumed nationwide passed through Mexico City’s airport-sized food supply depot, the central de abastos, and most of Mexico’s major retail, wholesale, marketing, and shipping businesses had their headquarters in its metropolitan area at this time. Outside of the capital, however, there existed a network of regional commercial centers, mostly located in the state capitals. And in spite of Mexico City’s predominance, trade in the northern states and the Yucatán was oriented more toward the outside world.

During the extreme years of this period, export values increased by only 26.7 percent. Apart from some sharp varia tions such as those that occurred between 1914 and 1916, in general exports grew considerably when the armed conflict was its height, increasing from US$129.4 million in 1910 to US$425.4 million in 1920, principally owing to a rise in the petroleum exports because of World War I and the nonexistence of state control over petroleum sales; foreign companies, from the United States in particular, took full advantage of the lack of oversight to avoid taxation. During these years Mexico was one of the world’s main producers and exporters of crude oil, exporting more that 145,000 barrels in 1920. In addition to petroleum, silver took on enormous importance, owing to the demand for and increase in the international price of this metal. During this period coffee, henequen fiber, fine woods, vegetables, chicle, cotton, skins, vanilla, and raw material were exported.

Export growth also was favored by the state, enabling a high export value from the 1920s, despite the fluctuations of 1923, when the price of petroleum and silver plummeted in the world market. The effects of the Great Depression, the decrease in exports, and once again a drop in petroleum and silver prices in 1932 were counteracted by an increase in subsequent years thanks to the export of agricultural products to the United States, in particular tomato, sugar, coffee, cotton, vegetables, strawberries, and other primary products.

Imports tended to decrease between 1910 to 1916, achieving a minimum in this latter year owing to the numerous disturbances provoked by the Revolution, as well as the reduction in international trade, which drastically shrank the export of European products, of which Mexico received only 45 percent of the total, consisting basically of food and armaments. From 1918 and until 1921 imports grew, only to fall later with the drastic drop in silver prices, which seriously affected an already limited purchasing capacity. In the 1920s imports rose, with some variations, at the same time as the effects of the Great Depression began to be felt at the beginning of the 1930s, only managing to recover their former level in 1934. During this period imports consisted principally of chemicals and pharmaceuticals, chinaware and glass, maize, corn, preserved good, and paper of all kinds. These imports came largely from the United States.