Mr. Tan
The government is trying hard to promote the hawker culture. I think that the only thing that they could do is to look at how the culture begins to understand the real issue.
Hawker centres in Singapore begins as streets stall. It was usually starts up that did not have a huge capital. To survive the hawkers improvise the recipe to charter to the local taste.
hence much if not all the hawker food emphasis on affordable ingredients and outstanding skills.
I believe that there is only one thing the government could do to keep the culture alive. That is to provide a platform for new start ups to revive the culture in its own. It could be done by permit of night markets similar to those in the region. Those who prefer to dine in categorise hawker stall could still enjoy their food there but those who are willing to try the streets stalls will have their choices too. After all, growth comes in stages, any attempt take away any part and the growth will stop or even mutate.
even if the government make the new hawkers goes for training, it is always a good platform for them to try it out at street stalls before they make it to a real hawker stall. In some countries, some street stalls are famous in new recipe when the operators trial their recipe while in business much like how our early hawker did. In hawker centres, it is tough to do this.
Above is my personal opinion, there might be other view on the issue, I am happy to hear different views on this.
Contributed by Tan Yee Fong
