Eggs for a bottle of wine, a tube of toothpaste for a carton of milk or perhaps some tomatoes in exchange for dog food?
As people in KwaZulu-Natal scramble for food and other supplies in the wake of this week's rioting and looting, residents of one housing estate in the Upper Highway area of Durban have launched a WhatsApp group for bartering goods.
The sell-and-exchange platform is the brainchild of 25-year-old entrepreneur and estate resident Tamryn Iyer, whose urgent need for painkillers kicked off the group that has grown to nearly 250 members in two days.
"Food and other supplies have been tough to source," she said.
"I was just pondering what was happening when I spotted body wash I had received as birthday gifts. I thought ... maybe I could swop them for painkillers.
"I made a group on WhatsApp, I added one other person on the estate and my mother to get it started."
Iyer said items in demand ranged from nappies and baby formula to meat for a dog on a raw-food diet. "People have been giving, taking, selling and meeting each other safely because of Covid-19. We are realising that money can't buy community."
She believes the platform has given residents "a glimmer of hope in this really devastating week".
Resident Katherine Meyer said she had exchanged homemade protein bars for milk and got to interact with her neighbour. "I'll exchange a tin of tomato and onion for more milk - our family likes milk - and perhaps eggs for wine."
Another woman addressing the issue is Ncumisa Fandesi Ndelu, who launched the "One Family, One Stockpile" group on Facebook several years ago. The group, which advocates stockpiling food and other household goods as a way of saving money, now has more than 360,000 members.
Ndelu issued a call this week for group members to share or sell the goods in their stockpiles.
One Family, One Stockpile organisers issued a call this week for group members to share or sell the goods in their stockpiles
"As stockpilers we have more because we spend our time buying more when the price is low," she said.
"My plea to fellow stockpilers is to use our stockpiles for good during this time. There's an outcry for baby formula and nappies ... Others are requesting food items to buy."
Christopher Nott of Lidgetton in the KwaZulu-Natal Midlands started a Whats-App group to provide his community with information about when and where to buy supplies.
"I felt the urgency to deal with . the delay in the supply chain. We saw this problem coming at us quite quickly," he said.
Christopher Nott of Lidgetton in the KwaZulu-Natal Midlands started a Whats-App group to provide his community with information about when and where to buy supplies.
"I felt the urgency to deal with . the delay in the supply chain. We saw this problem coming at us quite quickly," he said.
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