La Nueva Viga Market

With a surface of nine hectares, in La Nueva Viga you can shop fish and other seafood. This market is the biggest seller of sea products of Latin America, and the second biggest worldwide.

It is worth saying that the market sells de 65% of the national sea production, either fish, mollusk or crustacean, with a variety of over 500 sea species.

Since 1993, it has become a referent regarding commerce in Mexico. It was 202 wholesale warehouses and 55 retail shops. 

How it works. La Nueva Viga is not a neighbourhood market: it is the country's wholesale hub for fish and seafood, a run of warehouse halls where goods move by the crate, the sack and the kilo, and where the buyers are restaurants and fishmongers from across the metropolitan area. It also sells to the public, and that is the draw for visitors: wholesale prices on red snapper, sea bass, octopus, shrimp, clams, oysters and lobster, plus species that rarely reach ordinary markets.

What time to go. Business starts in the small hours as the trucks unload, and the liveliest stretch runs from about 6:00 to 10:00; after that the pace drops and many warehouses begin to close. Go early for the atmosphere and the photographs — and early to buy, too, since that is when the range is complete and the ice is fresh.

Practical advice. Bring cash, closed shoes you do not mind getting wet, and a cool bag if you are taking anything home. Ask the price per kilo before they weigh, and check that the fish has clear eyes, red gills and smells of the sea rather than ammonia. Inside there are counters where the market workers themselves have breakfast: shrimp broth, tostadas and cocktails at warehouse prices.

Getting there. The market sits inside the Central de Abasto in Iztapalapa, an enormous complex of internal roads and lorry traffic. The practical way is to drive or take a taxi straight to the seafood section, because distances inside the grounds are long and it is not a place to walk in from the gate.