If you have been paying attention to the news recently, one of the hottest topics of this season is the fight for survival for our hawkers. With the recent Phase 2 Heightened Alert (P2HA) in Singapore, many elderly and illiterate hawkers have been struggling to keep their business afloat as they are unable to integrate digital into their business. However, this also sprouted a lot of initiative by fellow Singaporeans to help these disadvantaged hawkers.
Here are some snapshots of the initiatives that there are available for hawkers:
Map showing the digitally disadvantaged hawkers
@wheretodapao - This Instagram account aims to help elderly hawkers gain some online exposure
These Instagram pages became an overnight sensation, with some even having 35k followers within a short span of one month. Hawkers who would like to increase their digital presence can approach any of these groups to feature their stall.
Facebook groups:
These Facebook groups are where you post all your lobangs and nice food/promotion to reach a greater audience. Some groups even have a whopping 300k followers!
Group buy platforms:
Telegram platforms:
@groupbuyssg
@wheretodapao
@SaveTheHawkersBot
Group buy platforms are where people can combine their purchases with other people to meet the minimum spending.
Delivery platforms:
WhyQ - Hawker specific delivery platforms
WhyQ is a platform that is aimed at helping hawkers integrate delivery into their buisness
How to go digital:
Photo taken from the IMDA SG digital office website
Starting from June 2020, the SG Digital Office from IMDA will be deploying a team of Digital Ambassadors to encourage stallholders in over 100 NEA hawker centres and markets, HDB coffee shops and JTC industrial canteens to adopt SGQR codes for e-payment.
Step 1. If you see these friendly SG Digital Digital Ambassador, you can go over and ask them more about this initiative
Step 2. Sign up with your NRIC, Current NEA or SFA License and Bank statement
(Photocopies will be needed and as they will be retained during sign-up)
Step 3. The Government will cover transaction fees (i.e. merchant discount rate of 0.5% payable by merchants) until 31 December 2023.
Read more https://www.imda.gov.sg/programme-listing/smes-go-digital/Hawkers-Go-Digital
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*This is not a sponsored post. If you know of any other platforms that were set up to help these hawkers during this period, let us know at hawkerscollective@gmail.com ! We are trying to build a directory for hawkers to grow their business during this trying period.