A Short Review on SINGAPORE: "The Lion City"

A three-hour flight from Cebu, Philippines aboard an Airbus A320 plane will take you to the smallest city-state in the Southeast Asia Region – Singapore.

Boasting as a natural port at the strategic portal of the Far East, Singapore has been the regions gateway since Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles of the British East India Company rented out the island by signing a treaty with then Sultan of Johor Hussein Shah. Since then, Singapore was developed as a trading post and settlement, marking the entrance of the then fisherman village to the modern era.

The World War II became the great equalizer of this country to be the little-giant economy as it is now.

From a country of mass unemployment, housing shortages and scarcity of natural resources left in the devastations of World War II, Singapore’s government led by General Lee Kuan Yew navigated Singapore’s economy and posed it to become an attractive location for foreign investors for it’s ideal location as a natural port at the Straits of Singapore “the gateway” of the Far East to the West.

To realize this vision, Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew initiated the urban planning and development of the main areas of Singapore through the Urban Redevelopment Authority. Major transportation and communication infrastructures were also built to complement the needs of the foreign direct investors aside from providing them ample tax incentives to initiate their business in the region. Major of the population were also moved to the countryside to lessen the density of the living publics in the urban areas.

50 years fast forward, Singapore now is the center of the growing international trade of Southeast Asia. As the 18th richest country in the world with total foreign reserves of US$ 139 billion aside from the bustling economy, the “Lion City-State” is also the center of electronics, manufacturing and financial trade in the region.

As new facilities, infrastructures and buildings requires land, Singapore has also reclaimed additional domains from the sea through the earth acquired from its hills, sea-bed and neighboring countries. From the original Land area of 581.5 square kilometers in 1960, Singapore’s total land area now is 699.3 square kilometers and growing. They are also planning to add another 100 square kilometers by year 2030.

More to its economic superiority is also Singapore’s aggressive lead in the Tourism industry in the region. In 2005, Singapore was visited by more than 9.7 million visitors all over the world contributing S$12.4 billion to the economy. They are also projecting a 14% increase of visitors every year.

The Singapore Government believes that the island-country-state may have been deprived of much raw materials needed for the economic growth of the country but we’re fortunate to have the resources that other countries have to drive growth of any country – Disciplined Manpower.