The end of the road for street food?
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Street food is one of the many charms of South East Asia, but there are signs this much-loved way of life and much-needed source of food is on the decline. We visit three of the region\\u2019s best-known street food areas \\u2013 Bangkok, Singapore and Penang \\u2013 to find out why.
A food hawker in Bangkok tells us his family\\u2019s stall, like thousands of others, was forced off the streets as part of a government move to clean up the city. Plus, Graihagh Jackson hears how these changes could have serious consequences for the city\\u2019s residents, many of whom have no kitchens at home and rely on cheap street food for their daily meals.
A family of street food vendors in Singapore, where the trade has been moved into enclosed food courts, tells us it\\u2019s long, hard and poorly-paid work, and that young people often have no interest in carrying on the tradition.
And in Penang, Malaysia, a government move to preserve local dishes by banning foreign workers may have backfired by removing a source of cheap labour vital to keeping many vendors afloat.
(Picture: A street food vendor in Bangkok, Thailand. Credit: Getty Images/BBC)
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