Singapore in 21st Century, Essay Example

Singapore is part of the four Asian Economic tigers with the other three being Hong Kong, South Korea and Taiwan. These tigers are known to record a seemingly meteoric increase in their GDP as well as increased exports to the neighboring as far as the distant countries (Singapore Department of Statistics 2007). This has placed Singapore at par with the other major Asian economies namely Japan and China. Singapore has also managed to implement an efficient medical care system which has seen hundreds of thousands of people visit the country to receive treatment. This coupled with the ever busy seaports with the enormous capacity to handle cargo makes it quite an interesting case to study.

One of the major problems that Singapore faces is water problem. Singapore is an Island with no fresh water lakes or rivers. This leaves the country with very few options on where they can source for water for both domestic and industrial use. The country is therefore fully reliant on rainfall as their only source of water for domestic uses (Ministry of Environment and Water Resources 2006). Since the rainwater can only satisfy half of Singapore’s demand for water, the country has to depend on water from Malaysia. The country have been involved in a tussle over the water supply with Malaysia claiming that they are not bound to water supply agreements that were entered into prior to independence. Singapore has therefore moved to avert any incidences of water shortage through the construction of water reservoirs and desalination plants.

The second problem that Singapore has faced is international boundary conflict with Malaysia. The international boundary dispute is on a Singapore island known as White Rock which has a land area of 2000 square meters and located 44 kilometers from the eastern coast of Singapore. The island has also some other rock outcrops approximately 1.1 kilometers off the main island and they belong to Malaysia. The countries were embroiled in a feud over the ownership of the white island with both staking a claim to it. The case was presented at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in 2007 where all the parties were heard. The ruling was delivered in the next year and the White Rock was said to be Singapore Territory while the rock outcrops were said to belong to Malaysia.

The third problem faced by Singapore is the Asia Economic crisis of the late 1990s and the global economic meltdown of 2008. The Singapore economy is highly dependent on export trade. This and also the fact that Singapore benefits indirectly from international trade of other countries by virtue of being on the sea route of many shipment lines makes them benefit all the more from international trade. This made Singapore suffer a major blow when the economic crunch. This led to their GDP dropping by an average of 2%. Many the Asian countries were forced to adopt fiscal policies to get out of the financial crisis. The IMF also stepped in and gave a $40 Billion aid to help revitalize the economies of the afflicted countries. The Economy of Singapore is therefore most certainly faced by tumultuous times every time their export markets are affected by the raging economic crisis. The only way to mitigate this is by diversifying the sources of national revenue as well as developing good reserve policy to help cushion the country against such economic mishaps.

References

Clean Water. Singapore Ministry of the Environment and Water Resources. Retrieved 26 Septembe 2009. Available: http://app.mewr.gov.sg/web/Contents/Contents.aspx?Id=83. Retrieved 2006-04-14.

Gross Domestic Product by Industry” (PDF). Singapore Department of Statistics. 2007. Retrieved 26 September 2009. Available: http://www.singstat.gov.sg/stats/themes/economy/ess/essa11.pdf. Retrieved 2007-09-13.

Transnational Issues of Singapore. The World Factbook. Central Intelligence Agency. Retrieved 26 September 2009 available: https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/sn.html#Issues.