Working for A Fresh Fruits Wholesaler (By Moh Teck)

My Favourite Jackfruit Tree

I developed an interest in fruit trees because I grew up in a Kampong area. As a kid, I shifted from Beach Road to Teng Tong Road. My grandparents managed to lease a piece of land from a local real estate mogul at an unbelievable sum of ten dollars a month.

On that plot of land, my grandparents build a zinc roof wooden house with walls made of wood boards. We had a small garden and managed to plant a few trees in the compound. The largest tree was our jackfruit tree which was in front of our porch. I remembered our family Raleigh bicycle leaning against the front porch railings, under the shade of the tree (to keep the bicycle seat cool). We also had papaya and pomegranate trees.

Our neighbour along Rambai Road had star fruit, mango, rambutan, chiku and banana trees. I observed how the hanging fruits were in newspaper to prevent keep away the birds and how long poles were used to bring down the fruits from the trees.

Throughout my adolescent years I was delighted with Lee Kuan Yew’s tree-planting campaigns, the botanic gardens and National Park’s foray into books on local trees and foliage.

It was natural that after I left Haw Par Villa Dragon World, when a job opening with a Pasir Panjang fresh fruits wholesaler came up, I applied for it. Part of the reason was my earlier sale and purchasing work experience with Eriks BV Singapore an industrial equipment distributor and I was familiar with the Pasir Panjang location.

As a note as to what happened to Haw Par Villa Dragon World: “They imposed high entrance fees which discouraged visitors. The only time they made a profit was during its first year of operation after renovations in 1994. They broke even in 1995 and subsequently incurred losses over the next three years. After 10 years of operation, the management incurred a loss of $31.5 million SGD and was forced to provide free entry in 1998.”

My First Brush with A Fresh Produce Wholesale Centre

After RI have moved from Bras Basah Road to Grange Road, I had to walk from my residences at Marine Drive to the bus-stop at East Coast Road, next to the Holy Family Church to take bus number 12 to school. The bus would later ply along Crawford Street, then North Bridge Road before turning right to cut through Upper Circular Road and right into New Bridge Road before crossing Coleman Bridge and turning left into River Valley Road with the old Hill Street Police Station on the right.

As the morning session for school starts at 7.30 am, I was already on bus 12 around 6 am to 6.30 am and when it came into this area, I was able sight Malaysian trucks unloading fresh vegetables meant for the market at the junction of Tew Chew Street and Boat Quay.

The bus route for bus 12 from 1971 and before 1974 was Bedok Road, Upper East Coast Road, East Coast Road, Mountbatten Road, Geylang Road, Kallang Road, Crawford Street, North Bridge Road, South Bridge Road, Upper Circular Road, New Bridge Road, River Valley Road, Delta Road, Alexandra Road, Tanglin Road, Margaret Drive, Queensway, Queen’s Circus, Queensway, Holland Road, North Buona Vista Road, Commonwealth Avenue.

As most of us that took bus 12 some 40 years ago could not remember clearly what happened, we only can guess it. I admit that I am guessing too. Colin Tan thought the bus travels along North Bridge Road, turns right into Carpenter Street or Hongkong Street or North Canal Rd (one of the three), goes onto New Bridge Road and turns left into Fish Street and comes out via Ellenborough Street and onwards towards River Valley Road.

Syed Sagoff said that he took bus 12 bus daily throughout secondary one and for half of secondary two. He believe that the wholesale market was at Upper Circular Road and that it operated till 7am. Thus, if the bus reached this place before 7am, it would go by either Carpenter Street or one of the streets further down South Bridge Road because Upper Circular Road was closed. After 7am, it would go by Upper Circular Road

This market at the junction of Tew Chew Street and Boat Quay was a smaller market compared to the earlier Ellenborough Market. By the time I was going to school, Ellenborough Market was already burnt down on 30 January 1968 by a fire that happened during Chinese New Year. Ellenborough Market was the second market built by the British after the Telok Ayer Market (opened 1823, now known as Lau Pa Sat).

It was constructed in 1845 by Captain Charles Faber. However, it poorly built and had structural problems showing cracks on its walls. In 1899, it had to be reinforced by a building extension using cast iron structure from an Edinburgh (Scotland) exhibition of 1897 was purchased in its entirety, dismantled, shipped to Singapore and reassembled at Singapore River.

After that the Teochews began populated the place, trading and selling fish, seafood and dried products. This gave rise to the naming of Ellenborough Street’s adjacent roads as Tew Chew (Teochew) Street and Fish Street. The locals called the new market Teochew Market, Pasar Bahru (New Market in Malay) or Sin Pa Sat. People come here for fresh fish, seafood, meat, poultry, vegetables, dried seafood, and other dried goods. There were both retail and wholesale markets.

Today, the Ellenborough Market site is occupied by Central Mall @ Clarke Quay and Merchant Court Hotel. Only Tew Chew Street remained. Boat Quay Road is now a pedestrainised mall. Ellenborough Street and Fish Street are no more.

Pasir Panjang Wholesale Centre (PPWC)

In the mid-eighties, to relieve traffic congestion and improve the physical environment of the downtown and city areas, the vegetable and preserved food hawkers at Ellenborough Street, Tew Chew Street, Johore Road, Rochor Road, Maxwell Market and Clyde Terrace Market were relocated to the centralised market at the new Pasir Panjang Wholesale Centre.

The Pasir Panjang Whole Centre was built in phases between 1981 and 1984. The wholesalers moved into it between 1983 to 1984. It was built by the Housing and Development Board (HDB) and cost $88 million. It included facilities such as stalls, shops, cold room spaces, a staff canteen block and an auction area.

Why the History?

Sometimes when I look back and piece the bits of information together, I realized that my geographical location (Singapore) and preferences (familiarity with Pasir Panjang); forces (government); social changes (traffic congestion in CBD area); events (opening of Pasir Panjang Wholesale Centre) created a scenario (HKFF advertised a job vacancy) in front of me when I getting out of a situation (leaving Haw Par Villa Dragon World). Of course, when I saw the job advertisement, I do not know of these behind the scene on goings and I could had made a different decision leading me to another path.

Huk Seng Fresh Fruits Pte Ltd (HKFF)

HKFF was one of the bigger fresh fruit wholesalers in PPWC. Fook Huat Tong Kee was the largest. I was working with HKFF from 2 September 1991 to 16 September 1992. It was started in 1982 and became insolvent in 2014.

This was a family business. The owners were Mr and Mrs Pang. They started in fresh fruits retailer and then became a wholesaler. They also had a building in Batam, which had a supermarket as well as a karaoke lounge in Batam. HKFF not only sell to local retailers but provided food and other supplies to ships at anchorages which HKFF staff reach by bumboats. Mrs Pang roped her 3 brothers into the business, managing the sales, accounts and cold room operations. Their son would later join the business.

Mr Pang has a brother that run Huk Seng Transport, which make the deliveries for HKFF as well as other customers located in PPWC.Mr Pang had a Sales Manager (Hoe Seng), whom was his friend’s son. He had through his contact in NTUC Supermarket, introduce the Sales Manager when he started out on his job and got him a job as a junior buyer for fresh produce, so that he would gather work experience to pick up the trade. Later, Mr Pang will hire Hoe Seng as a Sales Manager. From that, I thought that Mr Pang was a shrewd businessman.

I joined HKFF as an Executive was attached to the Finance Department, assisting the accountant with general accounting functions. I was then transferred to the Business Development Department as an Assistant Business Development Manager. I was looking after purchasing, liaison with suppliers, shipping documentation, cargo surveys, cargo claims, sales and other trading related activities.

Learning About Fresh Produce Business and Shipping

In my new role, I not only learned more about shipping documents but gained experience to work with shipping companies such as Maersk Line, American President Line (APL), Hanjin Shipping, Sealand Service but also had the opportunity to see how a cold room is operated and how cargo surveyors do their jobs.

Singapore is not an agricultural country so it is difficult to learn about postharvest diseases in fresh produce and how to identify, test and select fresh fruits for purchase. There is simply nobody to teach you. Buying for HKFF is about buying by air-freight or sea-freight containers and not just a few boxes. So I managed to pick up some basic knowledge by asking cargo surveyor and overseas suppliers that came to Singapore.

I also came to realize that because of Singapore’s size and population size, it does not have many wholesale centres and all businesses are family businesses. You will find family members or relatives working in them and there is discrimination in favour of family members or relatives in terms of job security, salaries and benefits, roles and treatment.

Pakistani Merchants and Pakistani Banks

Fresh fruits are perishables. They can be kept in cold storage only for a limited period of time. Singapore is a small market and if an importer overestimate how much this market can consume and overbuy its supplies, the importer will incur losses both from reducing prices to sell off its goods or from rotten fruits that had not been sold.

About 75 percent of Singapore’s population are ethnic Chinese. In the Chinese culture, mandarin oranges have been regarded as a symbol of good fortune. Originating from South China, the traditional act of giving someone mandarin oranges during Chinese New Year symbolises well-being and blessing one with prosperity. Despite the many variety of mandarin oranges, the supermarkets carry only certain types.

Pakistan is a large producer and exporter of Kinnow, with Sargodha as the largest growing region. It is considered a poorer quality fruit because each orange can have 12 to 25 seeds. The fruit matures in January and February, in time for Chinese New Year.

When in HSFF, I learnt that Singapore businessmen lived sheltered lives so they are not shrewd as Pakistani merchants. A Pakistani merchant came to Singapore to hunt for importers. He approached my boss and convinced him to buy a 20-footer container of Kinnow.

In international trade, the use of letter of credit against a bill or lading or airway bill helps to ensure that the buyer that he receives the goods he ordered before payment is released by the importer’s Bank to the exporter.

One would think that the banking institutions and banking system worldwide are trustworthy but that is not the case. The Pakistani merchant somehow was able to submit 2 letters of credit to his Pakistani Bank for 2 forty-footer containers of Kinnow that were sent to Singapore and my boss had to paid for more than what he really ordered.

With the money already in his pocket, the Pakistani merchant then pacified my boss that to help him lower his costs, he could reprice his goods at a reduced price and give him a credit note for next year’s order. The truth is that if the Pakistani merchant could not sell off his goods, the Kinnow from his family’s orchard would be rotting in his warehouse.

If my boss could not sell all the Kinnow, it would be a double for him because his would have paid off his import shipments through loans from the bank. It would become difficult for him to pay off the loans and interests.

Every time I heard of Temasek Holdings’ losses, the challenges faced by Lee Kuan Yew’s Suzhou Industrial Park, the sale of Neptune Orient Line (NOL), the sale of NatSteel, I would be reminded of this incident.

Daryl Arnold and Paramount Export Company

At the time that I got to meet Daryl Arnold, he had stepped down as the eighth US Ambassador to Singapore from 1987 to 1989. After that, Lee Kuan Yew (LKY) had appointed him as Singapore’s honorary consul in California to look after Singapore students that were studying at universities located in California. As an honorary consul, he received no pay but LKY arranged for him to be a Director in NOL’s Board and provided him a Cadillac with a Honorary Consul plate so that he can do his work.

Daryl Arnold personally owns a Cadillac and complained about the steering wheel out of alignment. It was only after I left HSFF and from the Straits Times that I learnt of his death by road accident.

When I met him, he was serving Western Growers Association. He offered 2 plane tickets to take my Sales Manager (unable to speak English fluently) and myself (act as interpreter and translator) to meet growers in US. He offered to put us up at his vacation home at Palm Desert in Palm Springs, California

When Daryl Arnold started doing business with my boss, HSFF was already importing fresh fruits from US from Paramount Export, but he was not told. They too were inviting us to go over to meet their growers.

Anthony Goh, the General Manager (Mrs Pang’s brother) wanted to take advantage of the free tickets, so that we could also meet up our contacts from Paramount Export as they had already invited HSFF a number of times to visit them.

Flight to California, USA

We travelled by United Airlines from Singapore and landed at Los Angeles International Airport. It was an 18 hours journey. As we were flying on economy tickets, I sat until my thigh muscles ached. We were picked up at the destination airport by a Chinese Singaporean male undergraduate student from University of California (Irvine, Southern Orange County, California). He was working for Daryl.

Initially Daryl put us up in a hotel. Later, we were driven in a Cadillac through Orange County to Palm Desert condominium, Riverside County when it was ready.

Entertainment

Daryl immediately put his diplomatic skills to work with the hope of winning HSFF as his long-term customer. Before his holiday residence was ready at Palms Desert, he put us up in a hotel in Orange County. He met us in person, introduced 2 lady associates and he took us to watch ladies oil wrestling. This could be one of the strip clubs in Anaheim.

Before the wrestling show, they will parade: each lady in bikini would walk around with a body guard along with her. Daryl paid ten dollars for her to wiggle in front of my sales manager and myself. Whenever 2 ladies are in the well-padded wrestling pit, the referee would ask if anyone would like to pour body oil on the ladies. One has to pay to pour the oil and to pay separately as well at a higher price to rub the oil down each’s lady’s body.

Later on, the undergraduate alone took us in a separate car to visit some seedy places in Orange County. First was a Vietnamese bar or massage parlour. What I noticed was a negro security guard at the entrance with a gun holster holding a colt 45 gun. I was told that brawls would sometimes break out at the place when clients became unruly. Feeling uneasy, we left the place.

There are numerous Vietnamese establishments. I suspected that they were resettled refugees from South Vietnam that were airlifted to the United States at the end of the Vietnam War in 1975, under President Gerald R. Ford.

Next, he took us to Paddy Murphy but we got lost. We stopped the car and asked a Negra at an open phone-booth for directions. Spotting a police car that was on the prowl, she shooed us off. The police car came quickly. A female police officer, with her hand on her gun holster asked us to “spread eagle” against the side of our car. We later that learnt that there were prostitutes that prowl the street in the area and prostitution is illegal in California, so it is an offence to soliciting prostitution. Luckily, by showing our identity cards and explaining ourselves, the police officer let us off.

We finally got to Paddy Murphy. I enjoyed the show performed by Heather Michaels, whom later I spoke briefly with. She told me that she lived in the Santa Ana area and her boyfriend was picking her up after the show.

All these experiences gave me a deeper understanding of permissiveness in the American culture as well as the impact of the Vietnam War on American Society.

Apples

The first part of the business trip was to visit grape and apple growers that were promoted by Daryl Arnold that were members of Western Growers Association.

Daryl was not free, so he assigned an elderly man whose profession I believed is a fruit quality control inspector. I believed his name was Phil Lombardo. He was a field staff.

A person doing this job should have

• Experience in Fruit/Vegetables quality control or inspection.
• Knowledge on quality standards for grapes, citrus, apples, pears, tropical fruits.
• Knowledge on postharvest conditions, transportation and storage of fresh produce commodities.
• Familiarity with product specifications and expectations

He brought us to meet some growers. In the visit, we pass by and enter orange and apple orchards. It was my first-time seeing oranges and apple trees. One of the places I remembered was a sorting, grading and packing lines for apples. The farm had just installed the line for 1 to 2 million dollars. Nowadays, you can watch how one of these line is operated on youtube. This is part of the post-harvest operations.

Grapes

I am no expert in grapes, so I will write of the little knowledge that I know. There are 3 types of grapes:

Table grapes – These are for eating. They are larger, seedless, with thicker pulp, thinner skins, juicy and have more water. They have less acidity and not as sweet as wine grapes. They have a brix of 17 to 19. Table grapes need to be hardy enough to withstand picking and shipping to supermarkets that maybe thousands of miles away. Growers also select them to have large clusters of globe-like berries that are uniform in size.

Wine grapes – They have thicker skin and large seeds, which imparts more favor into the wine. They are smaller in size, higher juice content (versus pulp) resulting in a concentrated taste. They are sweeter, with a brix of 24 to 26. They are delicate and difficult to transport.

Raisin grapes – These are dried grapes. They may be eaten raw or used in cooking, baking and brewing. The word “rasin” refers to the dark-coloured dried large grapes and the word “sultana” refers to the golden-coloured dried grape and currant refers to a dried small seedless grape belonging to the genus Ribes. Please eat raisin in moderation as they have high sugar content.

85 percent of table grapes are produced in the Southern San Joaquin Valley (mostly in Kern and Tulare County) and 14 percent in the Coachella Valley

There are 3 colour of grapes (red, black, green). HSFF imports red and green grapes of the following varieties of grapes: flame seedless, crimson seedless, thompson seedless, red globe, ruby seedless

My sales manager placed an order for one 40-footer container of Red Globe grapes. This is 44 cases.

I had a chance to speak to the grower. He told me that they were in the process of selling their grapes to Dr Pepper Snapple Group to make Snapple bottled drinks.

Coachella Valley and Palm Springs

Many American celebrities have their homes in Palm Springs. This includes Elvis Presley, Zsa Zsa Gabor, Bob Hope, Liberace, Marilyn Monroe, Nat King Cole, Dean Martin, Elizabeth Taylor, Kurt Douglas and even Billy Graham.

Palm Springs and Palm Desert were just two out of nine cities in the Coachella Valley.

Taking A Break in Los Angeles

I have a vague memory of going down Hollywood Boulevard. It is a major east-west street in Los Angeles. It runs through the central area in central Hollywood, where the tourist attractions such as Hollywood Walk of Fame, TCL Chinese Theatre (Grauman’s Chinese Theatre). From the TCL Chinese Theatre, the Hollywood Signboard could be seen.

I visited malibu pier santa monica pier venice beach.

Anyway, the 5 major film studios (Paramount Studios, Columbia Pictures / Sony Pictures Studios, 20th Century Fox, Universal Studios, Warner Bros) are in Los Angeles. I managed to visit Universal Studios and Disneyland Park in Anaheim.

We were staying at a motel when earthquake struck in the early morning. I found my bed moving from side to side and immediately I switched on the television for the news. This was the Landers earthquake on 28 June 1992. I then got dressed and went for an American breakfast (coffee, eggs and bacon) when I sensed that the earthquake died down. It was barely 6 am

Los Angeles to San Francisco on Interstate Highway 5

Our contact from Paramount Export Company picked up us in Los Angeles; and drove at top speed of over 100 miles per hour to San Francisco. The trip took 6 hours, with no stops in between, even for a pee. Throughout the journey I kept on worrying because the driver had to be extremely alert and the car in good operating condition. This is about 385 miles (620 km). There is little to see. I understand that Pacific Coast Highway (Highway 1) is more scenic and there are places you can stop but the trip would take longer.

International Lesbian & Gay Freedom Day Parade

When the car drove into San Francisco it met with a traffic jam. There was a parade and festival going on between Market Street and the Civic Center. It was the International Lesbian & Gay Freedom Day (now known as San Francisco Pride)

We dropped in at Paramount Export’s headquarters. This was near the Port of Oakland, in the San Francisco Bay Area.

I was surprised to see and know that there was a uniformed United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) officer that is stationed at the office, checking the documents and so on.

Eating Lunch at Hong Kong East Ocean Restaurant

As a welcoming treat, our host brought us to Hong Kong East Ocean Restaurant. This restaurant serves Hong Kong dims sum, Peking ducks and live seafood.

The restaurant is located in the Boat Bay Area, Emeryville. The City of Emeryville is located on the east shore of the San Francisco Bay in Alameda County.

This is a marina: a specially designed harbour with moorings for pleasure yachts and small boats.

The restaurant has large windows facing the San Francisco Bay. Some people claim that they can see Golden Gate Bridge as well as Alcatraz from it. I realized the Bay is linked to the Pacific Ocean. It was a fantastic view.

San Francisco Wholesale Produce Market (SF Market)

Our host brought us for a quick stop at the San Francisco Wholesale Produce Market. It was here that I first encounter a vending machine can squeeze fresh juices from oranges. I also saw 2 scantily ladies; which later I overheard were strip-teasers that some staff at one of the wholesalers hired as a good-bye gesture to a colleague that is retiring.

Oranges

Many of us are familiar with Sunkist oranges. The varieties that were sold in Singapore included Navel, Valencia, Cara Cara and Blood Orange. Sunkist was one of the brands that Paramount Export shipped to Singapore. Our host brought us to see one of Sunkist’s packing house.

Pears

Besides importing Sunkist oranges, HKFF used to import USA pears. These included Green Anjou, Red Anjou, Bartlett and Red Barlett. Our host could have brought us to see one of pear growers’ farms in Sacramento County, although I have little memory of it.

Apples and Cherries

My boss also imported a variety of apples through Paramount Export. These included Fuji, Gala, Golden Delicious, Granny Smith, Red Delicious

Another fruit that HSFF liked to import was California cherry.

Prunes and Nectarines

The only prunes that I ate before I had this job was dried prunes. It was only in this job that I had the chance to sample fresh prunes and nectarines.

Berries

HSFF also imported berries from Driscolls. These included strawberries, blueberries, raspberries and black berries, Our host took us to visit the farm and I had a chance to see how strawberries were grown and how they were picked. While we were onsite, we experienced some earth tremors. I am unable to remember if this is a farm in Watsonville, Santa Cruz County. It is 95 miles south of San Francisco. However, I do recall our did brought us to a authentic Mexican restaurant for lunch.

My Memory of San Francisco

I only have faint memory of the following sights of San Francisco

• Cable-car or tram
• Lombard street
• Russian hill
• Chinatown
• The Transamerica Pyramid
• Golden Gate Bridge and San Francisco Bay
• Fisherman’s Wharf
• View of the San Francisco Bay from Mason Street

What I could remembered more clearly was waiting at a bus-stop for a bus. There were only 3 other persons at this bus-stop. They spoke to each other for the first time. One was a elderly Chinese woman with all her personal belongings in a supermarket cart (she looked like a homeless person). Another was a Filipina who mentioned she was self-operating a newsletter and a negro. What surprised me was that they were discussing politics.

After Trip Reflections

I do not know about the current status of the agricultural industry in California, but a May 2011 California fact sheet published by the USDA Farm Service Agency (FSA) stated that the state had a population of 37 million people. It was the most populous state in United States. It stated that California is the most productive agricultural state in the United States and this is in part due to its fertile and temperate growing regions and in part due to its efficient and productive farming methods.

The USDA National Integrated Pest Management Database published a crop profile for grapes (table) in California in year 1999. It reported that California is ranked number one in production of table, wine, and raisin grapes in the United States, producing 97 percent of the table grapes grown in the United States and more than 10 percent of the world's production.

Not surprisingly, California has the most colleges and is one of 5 states in United States with most top ranked universities.

However, a map created by Malcolm Tunnell that presented the deadest natural disaster in each state showed that California was the only state seriously affected by earthquake.

According to the United States Geological Survey (USGS), California is seated on the earth’s crust in a location that spans two tectonic plate that makes up the San Andreas Fault System. These are the Pacific Plate (that includes the Pacific Ocean) and North American Plate (that includes North America). These two plates are moving horizontally, slowly sliding past one another. This accounts for the hundreds of faults identified in California of which 200 are considered hazardous. The San Andreas fault line in California is the longest in the world.

There are gun laws in California but they are not banned. Although it is claimed that the gun laws are strict, but it is hard to control the illegal sales and possessions of guns. So I was not surprised of news on mass shootings incidents in California over the years. An article “15 Biggest Companies in the World” in Yahoo Finance published on 17 November 2022 mentioned that about 18.8 million firearms were sold alone in the United States in 2021, and the industry contributed approximately $51.3 billion to the US GDP.

Remote working now allows more people to leave California because of the high costs and urban crimes.

In recent years, it is quite sad to see the increased number of homeless people and drug problem in Los Angeles and San Francisco from videos posted on Youtube.

Silicon Valley is located in the South San Francisco Bay Area. Steve Jobs was kicked out of Apple Inc. in 1985 and only would be back in Apple Inc. in 1997. Back in 1992, I did not know much about Silicon Valley.

It is also sad to learned that my former employer had folded. That explains why now I seldom see the varieties of fruits that it used to import into the Singapore market.