A campaign to do away with the need for market-farmers to issue receipts has now got backing from a local authority.
Lagos council has “wholeheartedly” endorsed the bid by local growers to be freed from the need to produce receipts when selling in the town’s weekly Saturday market.
Appealing to the government to “take an urgent position” to “the existing social reality”, the council claim new tax laws threaten to destroy the meagre living growers make from their weekly sales and kill a vital community service.
It is an issue that will have national consequences as farmers’ markets up and down the country face the government’s new ‘get-tough’ stance on taxes. In many ways, Lagos’ little market stands as the guinea pig in a civic movement for “good sense”.
“It is absolutely ridiculous that someone selling a tiny bunch of spring onions for 20 cents should have to issue a receipt,” explained retired teacher Lena Strang, who has been helping predominantly Portuguese growers publicise their campaign among the foreign-speaking community.
Lagos Câmara agrees, saying it considers the market a “space of elevated importance”, reports Correio da Manhã newspaper.
The campaign, which also has the backing of civic group ASMAA, is seeking to raise enough signatures to take a petition to Parliament. The petition can be found on:
http://www.avaaz.org/po/petition/Assembleia_da_Republica_Portuguesa_Exigimos_a_isencao_da_facturacao_para_os_pequenos_produtores_agricolas/
