Wednesday 7 June 2017
http://www.eco-business.com/opinion/the-four-pillars-of-singapores-sustainable-development-success/
At this week’s Ecosperity 2017 conference, Singapore’s
Deputy Prime Minister and Coordinating Minister for National Security Mr Teo
Chee Hean shared how Singapore has balanced economic, social, and environmental
priorities to achieve sustainable development. Below is an excerpt
of his speech.
Since the 1970s, economic development has helped to lift
billions of people out of poverty. Social indices of human development such as
healthcare and education have improved significantly.
But this progress is not even, and important challenges
remain. Social inequality, education and work opportunities for women, and
youth unemployment are still areas of concern for many countries.
Rising populism and protectionism in several advanced
economies, technological disruptions, and new transnational security and
pandemic threats add more complexity and uncertainty to health, safety, and
development.
Our environment is also under stress. Since 1972, the world
population has grown from 3.8 billion to 7.3 billion in 2015, and is expected
to grow to 9.7 billion by 2050. More than 54 per cent of the global
population already lives in urban areas.
Access to clean air, clean water, power, and sanitation are
challenges in many countries. Low-lying coastal communities such as
Singapore are also more vulnerable to rising sea levels due to climate
change.
Individuals, companies, countries, and the global community
will need to work together to develop solutions for sustainable development.
As a small, densely populated island nation with no natural
resources, Singapore’s own sustainable development experience has focused on
four key areas: Building a sustainable economy; creating a sustainable
living environment; ensuring sustainable development for our people; and
contributing to international collaboration.
Sustainable economy
Economic growth generates the resources to invest in
education, research and development, security, infrastructure, and public
services.
With no natural resources, Singapore has had to be
resourceful to make a living for ourselves. This has entailed finding
ways to create and add value, producing goods and services that are in demand
by others, and making careful use of resources.
This has required integrated and long-term planning to
optimise resources such as budget, land, manpower, energy, and more recently,
carbon emissions, to ensure sustainable growth.
We made early choices to turn away very pollutive
industries and took early action to switch to natural gas, the
cleanest form of fossil fuel, for power generation. Today, we are among the 20
most carbon efficient countries in the world.
We will intensify our efforts as we work towards achieving
our commitment under the Paris Agreement. We will reduce emissions intensity by
36 per cent from 2005 levels by 2030, and stabilise emissions with the aim of
peaking by then.
We plan to introduce a carbon tax from 2019 so that those
who emit the most carbon emissions will bear the cost to our environment and be
encouraged to reduce their emissions. There is also much potential for our
industries to save costs as we raise energy efficiency.
The carbon tax will also help align the costs and benefits
of reducing emissions. We are also scaling up deployment for solar, aggregating
demand across our agencies and testing floating solar photovoltaics on our
reservoirs.
These plans can help us to move towards a low-carbon
society, and also be a Living Laboratory for businesses, agencies, and research
institutes to develop new products and services for the global economy.
According to the recently launched ‘Better
Business, Better World” Asia report, opportunities in sustainability
could contribute US$12 trillion to global GDP and create 380 million
new jobs by 2030. I encourage our businesses to seize these opportunities.
Sustainable living environment
Our pioneer generation had a vision for a clean, green and
sustainable Singapore for all Singaporeans. They instilled in all of us the
consciousness that this little island is all that we have, and we have to look
after it well.
Over the past 50 years, we have seen vast improvements in
our housing, water, public health, and sanitation. Today, we are a City in a
Garden with about 47 per cent green cover in Singapore. More than 80 per cent
of households are within a 10-minute walk from a park.
We have 72 hectares of rooftop gardens and green walls
today, and aim to triple this by 2030. These plans are outlined in our
Sustainable Singapore Blueprint.
I have also just launched the Public Sector
Sustainability Plan, which will catalyse sustainable practices, generate demand
for green products and services, and encourage our public officers to think
green. These initiatives will achieve a green and sustainable living
environment for all Singaporeans.
With no natural resources, Singapore has had to be
resourceful to make a living for ourselves. This has entailed finding
ways to create and add value, producing goods and services that are in demand
by others, and making careful use of resources.
Sustainable development for our people
Our people are our precious and only resource, and
investing in them is of utmost importance.
Since the 1960s, we have worked to achieve mass
education at the primary, secondary, and tertiary levels. Our next frontier is
mass continuing education to prepare for the future of work. Rapid technological
advances will change the nature of work and the skills required.
The knowledge and skills we acquire through conventional
pre-employment education during the first 20 years of our lives will need to be
refreshed to last a working life of over forty years.
Our workers must be prepared to constantly upskill and
reskill, and move into new jobs and industries several times in their working
lives. SkillsFuture Singapore will work closely with our associations, unions,
and companies to support our workers to deepen and refresh their skills at key
points in their careers.
International collaboration
Nations also need to work together to address
global challenges. Issues such as transboundary air pollution or pandemics
require a regional response, while others such as climate change require the
contribution of all countries.
Singapore remains committed to the Paris Agreement and
supports the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development,
which provides a framework to guide national efforts in
achieving the 17 Sustainable Development Goals.
In support of this agenda, we have trained more than 112,000
officials from over 170 developing countries in key areas such as sustainable
urban, water, and human resource management, health, and education.
We will continue to share our sustainable
development policies and expertise through leadership seminars in policymaking,
workshops on urban governance in cities, and water and sanitation projects.
In the course of our development journey, Singapore has
benefited from the experience of many countries as we developed, and we
continue to do so. We hope that our collaborations in sustainable development
can, in a similar way, make a small contribution to the development paths and
journeys of other countries.
Through international partnerships, we can collectively find
more efficient, more comprehensive, and more sustainable solutions to address
global challenges.
The four aspects of sustainable development that I have
highlighted work in combination with one another. Strong partnership between
the public, private, and people sectors will be required to shape a sustainable
future for all of us.
Eco-Business is a content partner for Temasek’s Ecosperity sustainable development
event, which was held on Monday 5 June in Singapore.
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