My Take | Hong Kong’s illegal barbecue site something to chew on
- Unlicensed outdoor area that had been going for years before being finally raided is just one example of the inefficiency and wastefulness that has built up in the city over the past two decades
By itself, it’s a minor local news item, typical of the government’s law enforcement that often wastes substantial public resources yet achieves very little.
But multiplying such inefficiencies and wastefulness little by little millions of times over the past two decades, it’s little wonder the city reached a boiling point two years ago.
Maybe I am reading too much into this case, but it caught my eye because my family and I ate at this unlicensed outdoor barbecue site in Mei Foo several times many years ago.
Well, I didn’t check if it had a restaurant licence then; it was popular.
Finally, apparently after 18 years of being an unlicensed operation, police and Food and Environmental Hygiene Department inspectors recently cracked down on the site in Kau Wah Keng. Two operators failed to show up for their court summons last week. Warrants have been issued for their arrest. Nothing terribly unusual, so far.
Authorities seem to have stepped up enforcement in recent years. Let’s check out the law enforcement records: 41 times in 2017; 31 in 2018; 36 in 2019; 27 in 2020; and 28 so far this year. These raids secured the following annual numbers of convictions or fines respectively during the same period: 73, 49, 42, 38, 28.