Where supply and demand meet: how consumer and vendor interactions create a market, a Nigerian example

Abstract Traditional food markets in lower-income countries are constructed through the interactions of their participants: those who sell and buy it. Their joint actions motivations interact to determine what is sold, whom, at which price; these shaped by interpersonal relationships cultural norms. Understanding dynamics useful for crafting equitable impactful policies program interventions that leverage, rather than oppose, market actors’ initial motivations. This paper examines this process “making a market” case study vendors consumers Birnin Kebbi, Nigeria. It answers four interrelated research questions series in-depth interviews with (n = 47) 37) using methods drawn from focused ethnography. The results demonstrate transactions influenced complex interaction vendors’ norms on competition collaboration, consumers’ needs credit amid unpredictable prices restrictive gender norms, “moral economy” appears guide behavior. Based this, it suggested conceptualization characteristics shape consumer choices within environments should be broadened include factors such as access bargaining ability, trusted enable them.