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31 Dec 2008
EDB reports an outstanding year of growth and quality investments in 2007
“Creating New Opportunities for Growth”
1. Commitments in Fixed Asset Investments (FAI) brought in by the Singapore Economic Development Board (EDB) in 2007 exceeded S$10 billion, for the first time ever, by a wide margin. It was also a record year for Total Business Spending (TBS) and number of jobs created. These strong investment achievements will open up new opportunities for growth and jobs. 2007 was notable for the depth and quality of investments in capital-, knowledge- and innovation-intensive activities that these investments will bring to Singapore in the coming years.
(I) YEAR 2007 IN REVIEW
2. The investment commitments for year 2007 are given below:
| 2007 Investment Commitment Indicators |
| Indicator |
2006 Actual |
2007 Forecast |
2007 Actual |
| Total Value-Added (VA) per annum generated from projects (S$ billion) |
13.4 |
11.0-11.5 |
11.6 |
| Fixed Asset Investment (FAI) from manufacturing (S$ billion) |
8.8 |
8.5–9.0 |
16.1 |
| Total Business Spending (TBS) from services\r\n(S$ billion) |
2.8 |
2.7–2.9 |
3.0 |
| Total Employment Creation |
26,800 |
20,000 –25,000 |
28,600 |
| Skill profile (professional and skilled jobs) |
64% |
65–70% |
65% |
3. EDB delivered good results in all five indicators in 2007, exceeding the forecast for the year in VA, FAI, TBS and job creation.
4. Close to 400 projects were committed in 2007. When fully implemented, they are expected to create 28,600 new jobs and add S$11.6 billion per year to Singapore’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Of the 28,600 jobs created, many will be in the fields of engineering, management, research, as well as creative and industrial design.
5. These projects not only help in developing depth in our key industry clusters, but are also notable in that many will provide the spark for new clusters to grow, such as in Clean Technology. They reflect strong investor confidence in Singapore. It also affirms manufacturing as a critical component of Singapore’s economic growth, and underlines our ability to continue to attract high-end complex manufacturing projects, which brings in quality jobs for people living in Singapore.
6. Even as EDB brings in projects with increasing demands on the skills of our workforce, we continue to invest in developing local talent to ensure that the craft and skill-sets of our workers fully meet industry requirements. To that end, we have rolled out three manpower initiatives in 2007:
- Wafer Fabrication Specialist Manpower Programme, which will fund the training of some 900 specialised engineers for the semiconductor industry in our tertiary institutes.
- Precision Engineering Manpower Initiative, which will fund the training of some 2,000 people at the Polytechnic and ITE level, enhancing their expertise and skill-sets in Precision Engineering. This in turns allows them access to a wide variety of jobs within Singapore’s manufacturing sector.
- Finally, the Clean Energy Scholarship which aims to churn out the future industry leaders of the Clean Energy sector by sponsoring 130 Masters and PhDs locally or overseas.
For media enquiries, please contact:
Alex Tan
Tel: (65) 6832-6284
Mobile: (65) 9841-0392
Email: alex_tan@edb.gov.sg
Ms Eileen Ng
Communications
Tel: (65) 6832-6660
Mobile: (65) 9369-8598
Email: yeeling@edb.gov.sg
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