It is interesting to see over the past decade or so, as countries such as India and Thailand are putting more and more pressure on their street vendors to shut them down, that illegal street vendors are springing up all over North America — San Francisco, New York, Washington D.C., Los Angeles…the small guy is back. All over the world, sometimes this is the only way a family can make a dollar.

Last year in Los Angeles there was a crack down on street vendors, supposedly people were worried about the health safety of the vendors, but it may have been motivated more by racism. These days it is clear we need to be more concerned about food coming from the industrial-agriculture food sector, and not waste resources hassling street vendors. Most small-scale street vendors are very conscious of where their food is coming from and how they process it, they often know their customers in fact, their personal livelihood depends on their repeat business. They also take pride in their creation. Some of the new movement of pavement culinary artists may have even wild-harvested their ingredients!