Food - not a time to count dollars and cents
Tue, Feb 05, 2008
my paper
AMID the gloomy reality of rising food costs and larger food bills this Chinese New Year, the festivities must still go on, many consumers say.
Retiree Madam Alice Fong will be spending $500 to hold her family reunion dinner at a Chinese restaurant this year as the two-room senior citizens' flat she just moved into is too small to accommodate her extended family of 10.
Madam Serene Tang, 34, added: "It's not a time to count dollars and cents. It?s about the people you're going to be with and how meaningful their company is."
The civil servant spoke to my paper yesterday, while waiting in a snaking queue of customers outside Lim Chee Guan barbequed pork stall in Chinatown.
By 3pm, shop assistants held out signs saying that the barbequed pork had sold out but hopeful customers remained in line.
Its managing director, Mr Rod Lim, 57, said that it was too early to estimate if this year?s business was better than the last, although he let on that his barbequed meat was selling out two hours earlier than it did during the same period last year.
Mr Thomas Yeo, 46, felt that people were not tightening their belts because Chinese New Year is a once-a-year occasion.
Said the marketing director, who is back on a two-week holiday from Tokyo, where he works: ?By cutting back on daily expenses, such as switching to public transport, you will be able to save more compared to just holding back on just one day.?
Others felt that the prosperity- driven focus of the Chinese New Year traditions made spending hard to curb.
Said Ms May Soh, a 37-year-old executive, who spent $600 on hampers of abalone and chicken?s essence for her parents, grandparents and in-laws: ?It is important to give gifts as a sign of respect to our elders, so you can?t cut back on that.?
Madam Tang agreed, and chipped in: ?There?s also the value of face involved. If you cut back on your hongbao money, people might say you are not doing so well.?
Hawkers at wet markets say business has dropped by 20%
By Lian Cheong and Julia Ng, Channel NewsAsia | Posted: 05 February 2008 2033 hrs
SINGAPORE: Some hawkers at wet markets are complaining that business has dropped by some 20 percent as customers are staying away due to rising food prices.
In the past years, many Singaporeans would have completed their shopping at the wet market to prepare for the Lunar New Year reunion dinner the following night.
Stallholders at the Chinatown wet market said shoppers are more cautious this year. Fewer are buying seafood like prawns and pomfrets even though the prices have not changed much from last year.
There is also ample supply of live poultry from Malaysia, which has kept prices affordable. The price of pork, though, has been going up.
Some stallholders said they are absorbing the costs so that they can sell more.
Fruits and vegetables have seen the biggest price fluctuations. In some cases, prices have shot up by as much as 50 percent.
Citrus fruit tangor cost S$8 per kilogramme on Monday, but overnight, the price rose to S$12.
Stallholders said rainy weather in Malaysia has affected the harvest of most vegetables, and some now cost 30 percent more.
- CNA/so
Business in heartland markets down as prices of goods increase
By Channel NewsAsia | Posted: 07 February 2008 0024 hrs
SINGAPORE: There is always the last-minute buying as we usher in the Year of the Rat.
However, suburban markets in the heartlands are not exactly feeling the festive cheer.
Stall-holders in a market in Bukit Panjang also known as the mini-Chinatown, are seeing red.
They said business is down by some 20 to 30 per cent.
And the reason is the higher than usual prices of goods even though stallholders claim they've tried to keep prices as low as possible.
The same situation is faced by stallholders in another market at Toa Payoh.
Some stallholders also blame the smaller display areas allocated, following new guidelines drawn up in 2007.
Town Councils said the guidelines are meant for public safety. -CNA/vm