“A blighted urban jungle of concrete destroys the human spirit” – Prime Minister Mr Lee Kuan Yew

Sustainable behavior started in Singapore around the 1960’s. At that moment, there were slums and the city was overpopulated and dirty. It became clear to the former Singaporean leaders at that time that Singapore had to change, and they started to think of a long term view on Singapore and the environment. The quotes listed on this page show the way of thinking of Prime Minister Mr Lee Kuan Yew in those days. Other countries were not even thinking about ‘being green’ at that moment!

“We need the greenery of nature to lift our spirits” – Prime Minister Mr Lee Kuan Yew

Since 2009, there is a Singaporean‘Blueprint’ with targets and initiatives. Two examples are ‘Minimum energy and water efficiency standards for more household appliances’ and programs ‘to encourage waste reduction and recycling’. According to the Sustainable Singaporean Blueprint 2015, Singapore is on track to achieve the 2020 and 2030 targets. To do so, the Singaporean Government will spend S$1,5 billion on this project untill 2030 for a more liveable and sustainable future.

There are three main Pillars of Sustainable Development in Singapore: Social-, Economic- and Environmental well-being. Economic well-being is actually not a sustainable factor, but it is an important factor to keep in balance with the other ones. A lot of researchers actually see a main focus on economy as one of the main causes of unsustainable behavior and overpopulation. In many countries, the economy is way more important than environment and sustainability. However, figure 1 shows that the Ministry of the Environment and Water Resources and the Ministry of National Development of Singapore (2014) try to achieve a balance in those three pillars to reach a sustainable country. This means that the economy in Singapore should be just as important as social and environmental well-being. A beautiful way of thinking.