Koufu unit to stop managing Jurong West Hawker Centre

KOUFU subsidiary Hawker Management (HM) announced on Tuesday that it will no longer manage Jurong West Hawker Centre (JWHC) when its contract expires on Aug 6, 2020.

HM said that it was appointed the hawker centre's operator in 2017 and has since been putting in the necessary resources to bring vibrancy to the centre, but that despite its efforts, "the results did not meet our ideal performance standards".  

HM, a socially-conscious enterprise, was set up as part of the Koufu Group's corporate social responsibility (CSR) efforts. It said that Koufu, as a publicly-listed company, has an obligation to safeguard shareholders' interests.

The difficult decision to exit was thus made to focus efforts on other aspects of Koufu's business. Koufu has other avenues for CSR efforts and will continue to look at other such opportunities, HM added.

HM said it will work with the National Environment Agency (NEA) and reach out to incumbent stallholders at JWHC to relocate them to NEA's hawker centres/markets or to Koufu's food courts and coffee shops.

As a gesture of goodwill, HM will provide rental waivers for JWHC's stallholders from June and until the end of their tenancy. It will also offer a S$1,000 relocation fee to eligible stallholders.

NEA separately announced on Tuesday that it will conduct a request for proposal (RFP) to enhance the hawker centre's operations and offerings so they can better meet the needs of residents.

It is estimated that the hawker centre will be closed temporarily after HM's exit and will reopen in the second half of 2021. Existing stallholders will be offered the option to return to the rejuvenated JWHC when it is ready - provided they wish to return.

Senior Minister of State for the Environment and Water Resources Amy Khor said NEA's immediate priority is to work with HM to ensure that incumbent stallholders will be well taken care of during this period of transition and that it would help all to find a stall to continue their hawker trade if they wish to.

Koufu shares were trading at 61.5 Singapore cents as at 4.52pm on Tuesday, down 0.5 cent or 0.8 per cent.