义顺镇商业活动的调查硏究 = A SURVEY OF THE COMMERCIAL ACTIVITIES IN NEE SOON TOWN, SINGAPORE

Abstract

Nee Soon, Which is located at the junction of Sembawang Road and Mandai Road, is one of the small towns in the suburban area of Singapore. The town performs many kinds of functions with the commercial activities predominating. This thesis study the commercial activities in the town. According to the survey # there are 224 shops and 180 hawkers in the town # in which 56.3% of the shops are distributed along Upper Thomson / Sembawang Road, while the remaining distributed along the roads off Sembawang Road, namely, Transit Rood, Chong Kuo Road, Nee Soon Rood and Thong Bee Road. Most of the hawkers are located around or inside the bazoar although some of them are also located along the open spaces of Chong Kuo Road and Thong Bee Road. In the town, there are three types of commercial activities, in which retailing is the most important. It occupies 74.5% of all the activities, followed by service business 23.2%, the wholesale or Agent function 2.3%. On the reasons for shopkeepers in the town to establish their shops, 33.1% of them attribute to their living in the town or nearby village, and 20.5% (especially the shopkeepers of stores, electricity, tailors and watch salers) attribute to the establishment of British forces in the area. The goods for sale in the shops as well as hawkers are obtained in different ways. The sources of the goods of retailers vary with their orders, but most of the goods are come from the whole salers. The commodities of the whole salers or agents are purchased directly from the firms or imported from foreign countries. On the other hand, the sources of the goods of hawkers vary with each other, but, more frequently, they involve middle man. Most of the shops (56.5%) (except sundries, electrical and furniture shops) have no need of sending goods to the consumers. Finally, according to the surveys 60.7% of the consumers in the bazaar have within one mile distance from the town. The future development of the town and the surrounding areas will attract more population. At present, a luxury housing estate is under construction in the eastern and southern part of the town. Meanwhile ， the existing Sembawang Road will be expanded in the near future and the proposing Ang Mo Kio New Town is just 3 miles away from the town. All these developments will benefit the commercial activities of Nee Soon Town.