Deputy Prime Minister BG Lee Hsien Loong

Minister for National Development Mr Mah Bow Tan

Minister without Portfolio Mr Lim Boon Heng

Members of Parliament for Bukit Timah GRC

Grassroots Leaders, Residents and Friends

Singapore is a small country and a crowded city-state. We are not blessed with natural beauty. We do not have a nice countryside, clear lakes or picture-like scenery. We have to create our own brand of "beautiful Singapore" through our own vision, effort and determination. This was exactly what we did.

To transform Singapore into a clean and green city, we started "Tree Planting Day" and launched the "Keep Singapore Clean" campaign some 30 years ago.

Through the years, we cleaned up the Singapore River; we re-located unhygienic hawker stalls from back lanes and streets into hawker centres; and we reduced the number of flood prone areas. How well have we done?

Dr. Jay Walder of the Kennedy School of Government spent a year at the National University of Singapore. He summed it up best when he said, "Singapore is an incredibly easy place to live. It is clean, safe and its infrastructure works……. We became fond of "hawker centers" ……..They have done a fabulous job with drainage. The country doesn’t stop because of rain".

Indeed we have worked hard for more than 30 years to make Singapore what it is today - clean and green. It has not gone unnoticed by visitors to Singapore. This is an achievement all Singaporeans can be proud of.

It is, however, worth pointing out that keeping Singapore clean and green does not come easy. More importantly, it does not come cheap. Every year, the Ministry of the Environment and the town councils spend more than $120 million to keep our public areas and housing estates clean. National Parks Board spends about $80 million a year to keep Singapore green. If we include the money we spend on pollution control and waste management, the total sum is more than $400 million a year. This is not a small sum, by any standard, for a nation of our size.

There is an intangible cost as well. Singapore is well known as a Garden City. Singapore is also well known as a "Fine City". What it actually implies is that Singapore is a "City of Fines".

We need to strengthen our personal and collective commitments towards keeping Singapore clean, green and orderly if we ever hope to be rid of this negative image of Singapore as a "fine" city.

After 30 years of public education efforts, some Singaporeans still litter even though bins are within easy reach. Why do they do it? The typical excuses are "I forgot", or "I didn’t think much of it". After all, what can a small cigarette butt or a bus ticket do to mar the environment? So they think.

At a recent briefing given by my ENV colleagues, I was shown pictures of a float boom placed across the mouth of a canal leading to Singapore River. Caught behind this float boom is a mass of litter thrown by people at the upstream of the canal. It is a big mess. You’ve got to see it to believe it.

Looking ahead, what should we strive to achieve in the new millennium? There are at least three alternatives as we move forward.

The first alternative is for us to spend even more money, and deploy even more people every year to clean up even more litter. But this approach may not be sustainable, bearing in mind that we are already spending $400 million a year. Even if we can afford to spend much more to collect and process waste, it may not be the best use of our limited manpower, land and money.

Another alternative is to step up enforcement, impose heavier fines, or introduce new fines to deter irresponsible acts. However, this will reinforce our reputation of being a "fine" city, and retard our progress towards becoming a gracious society and a nation of excellence.

A more optimal and sustainable approach is for us to build on our social foundations, and strive to achieve better outcomes through "community participation". If every Singaporean takes pride in this beautiful nation of ours and plays a part in keeping it clean and green, I am sure we will be able to achieve much more with less in the years ahead.

Fortunately, we do not have to start from scratch. Many Singaporeans are already playing their part. Many have also volunteered their time and effort to help take care of the environment.

For example, the Singapore Environment Council has 500 Green Volunteers. Members of the Waterways Watch Society patrol Singapore River and Kallang River every weekend to look out for sources of pollution. The Habitat Forum is working on a series of strategies to address the problem of littering in Singapore. Some of our school children are also looking after parks under the Adopt-a-Park scheme.

The Ministry of the Environment looks forward to collaborating with the people sector and the private sector to jointly formulate and implement community programmes that will help cultivate positive social habits in our communities. Working in partnership, we can reduce incidences of littering, air pollution, noise nuisance and dirty public toilets. We can also recycle more, so that there will be less waste to be disposed of.

In the coming years, we aim to conduct these community efforts in a focussed and concerted manner so as to broaden the base of community participation. We are confident that through greater community participation, we will be able to sustain a clean and green Singapore, and transform Singapore into a "fine" city in the real sense of the word, hopefully in the not-too-distant future.

It now gives me great pleasure to invite our Guest-of-Honour, DPM BG Lee Hsien Loong to launch the eleventh Clean and Green Week.