Singapore’s government helps old food hawkers but not young ones

SOME COUNTRIES build palaces or temples as monuments to their greatness. Singapore builds hawker centres. In these open-air food courts lined with stalls and formica tables it is possible to taste Singapore’s history. Dolloped unceremoniously on a plate or banana leaf or scooped steaming into a plastic bowl, dishes such as roti prata and Singapore laksa conjure up the Indian and Chinese migrants whose own cuisines, slowly over centuries, mingled with that of the indigenous Malays. And since one can eat one’s fill at a hawker centre for the price of a flat white, it is no surprise that eight in ten Singaporeans visit such establishments at least once a week, according to a survey conducted by the National Environment Agency in 2018. Singapore is so proud of its street food that it hopes UNESCO will include it in its catalogue of humanity’s most precious arts. 

The UN’s heritage inspectors had better tuck in fast. The median age of the chefs is 60. A government report published in 2017 warned that there were “too few [aspiring hawkers] to be able to sustain the hawker trade in the long run”. When old masters die, many take their recipes with them, says K.F. Seetoh, a champion of hawker food. Only Singaporean citizens can work in hawker centres managed by the government, the vast...

Read More