The World Street Food Masters Winners Are
By Tris Marlis - Tuesday, Jun 25, 2013
The World Street Food Awards, a recognition programme component of the World Street Food Congress, has crowned Singapore as the Best Street Food City. The lion city has met the criteria for this category, including having an engaging relationship between governments, street food vendors and industry players to preserve, promote and celebrate comfort street food culture.
Singapore’s street food culture tracked back to the 1950s when immigrants came to Singapore with their heritage recipes. It was estimated there were about 24,000 illegal mobile hawkers on the streets of Singapore then. Due to health and environment concerns, the government created “Hawker Centre” in the 60s with up to 150 small kitchen spaces where street food vendors were relocated. They are provided with clean water, electricity and proper setting. Today, there are 107 such hawker centres island wide where hawkers continue to dish out their iconic fare in these places – no frills, cheap and delicious.
ny Singaporeans today can bid for a stall, starting from as low as $21 per month. Her Government will also fund up to 90% of any citizen looking to study at approved street food academies. They have also started issuing licenses for mobile food trucks and pop-up street kitchens to relive the good old days when street food was on the streets.
Besides winning Best Street Food City, Singapore has also secured victory in other categories: Best Street Food Hawker Centre (Old Airport Rd), Best Street Food Café (Immigrants Gastrobar), Best Street Social Enterprise Food Association (Dignity Kitchen) and Street Food Entrepreneur of the Year (George Quek of BreadTalk). Three of Singapore’s hawkers are among the Top 20 Street Food Masters of the Year, including Wee Nam Kee, Hill Street Char Koay Teow and JB Ah Meng…
The World Street Food Awards is the first of its kind which recognises street food excellence and seeks to inspire skills development, stimulate education, create jobs and self-employment opportunities. The congress comprises a worldwide team of advisors (including World Street Food Council members) alongside a team of international researchers and peers, including event creator Makansutra. It has, for the last 17 years, been working to identify the list of reputable players in this field internationally. The award is divided into 10 categories, covering various aspects of this industry.
For full list of World Street Food Awards winners, go to www.wsfcongress.com
