Centre for Liveable Cities Lecture Series
“From Garden City to City in a Garden”
Transcript of the lecture featuring Dr Chua Sian Eng, former Commissioner of the Parks and
Recreation Department, Dr Shawn Lum, President of Nature’s Society Singapore, and Mr
Poon Hong Yuen, Chief Executive Officer of the National Parks Board. The lecture was
moderated by Professor Neo Boon Siong, former Dean of the Nanyang Business School,
National Technological University.
15 July 2013
MND Auditorium, Singapore
Dr Chua Sian Eng:
Thank you ladies and gentlemen. Well, the Garden City campaign started in 1963 with the
former Prime Minister, Mr Lee Kuan Yew, inaugurating the Tree Planting Day. He had
planted trees at every Tree Planting Day since that time. The whole idea of this greening
campaign was to make Singapore interesting, so that during the urbanisation and
industrialisation of Singapore, the trees that were cut for development would be replaced in a
proper manner — because he did not want Singapore to be a concrete jungle.
So, the Parks and Recreation Department was formed in 1974, and the first Commissioner
was Mr Wong Yew Kwan. He carried out the work and in 1983 when he retired, I took over.
We continued the greening work by aggressively planting and also developing parks, so that
the Singaporeans could enjoy these places in their spare time. And we also were interested
in planting trees along the roadside to provide shade for the people who commute in buses,
so that they do not have to walk under the hot sun. The Prime Minister at that time was very
keen to see that a lot of shade trees were planted, so that people could enjoy a cool walk —
and especially in parks. We developed various types of parks for Singaporeans to enjoy. For
example, in Pasir Ris we developed a children’s park, so that the family on weekends could
bring the children to enjoy the outdoors. We also did some conservation work, in a sense, in
Pasir Ris, we had mangroves and we conserved that area. That became a place where
school children could go and look at the marine life in that area. At Sungei Api Api, we
replanted the mangrove — so that it could thrive there, and so that the marine life could
thrive also — in the 1981 I think.
Besides the parks themselves, we also connected the parks. Dr Lee Sing Kong and I
published a book called More than a Garden City in 1992. We tried to connect all the parks
so that the Singaporeans could go from one park to another, by jogging or cycling. We also
developed so-called “long-grass” areas, whereby the bird life could also thrive. We did plant
along these park connectors some fruit-bearing trees, shrubs like melastoma and the
common cherry tree. Also, the long-grass areas were left so that insects could thrive, so
some of the birds could feed on the insects. We also introduced some birds, like the magpie
robin, in protected areas like the Istana and Botanic Gardens, because they were depleting
in number; some of [them] were captured to put in cages by locals, and the numbers were
decreasing. We had an ornithologist, by the name of Chris Hails, and he introduced a few
pairs of this magpie robin in Singapore. Now, they are all thriving very well and you can hear
them singing in the morning and in the evening.
At present I think the National Parks Board has developed more park connectors, especially
in Punggol. I think you can see that the development is done in such a way that you have the
waterways being incorporated into the park corridors. So the park connector idea is in fact a
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very good idea to connect all the parks and the people can enjoy them.
In 1981, the Prime Minister initiated the planting of fruit trees in government institutions and
in schools. His whole idea was to inculcate social discipline. He told me that when he went to
Greece or Japan, he noticed a lot of these fruit trees along the roadsides, like persimmons
and oranges in Greece — and they were never plucked. He wanted to have the same idea
to plant these fruit trees, especially in housing estates. But anyway, that one didn’t go that
well because in the end a lot of the fruits were dropped and [they] were not well co-ordinated
by the residents’ committees. But some of the fruit trees are still left in the housing estates.
Also, [Deputy Prime Minister] Dr Goh Keng Swee was told me to co-ordinate the planting of
fruit trees in [army] camps; he wanted the general duties staff to do some work to maintain
the fruit trees. So we did plant in camps like the Amoy Quee Camp, pineapples trees, and
also Kranji. I also helped him to build an acre of hydroponic farms to produce vegetables,
which supplied the camps with the vegetables that were produced.
In order for the Prime Minister to know the progress of the Garden City Campaign, the
Garden City Action Committee was formed in 1973, I think. And I think it was chaired by the
Permanent Secretary of Ministry of National Development. The monthly minutes were sent
to [the Prime Minister] and I think he read every bit of it to see the progress of the greening
campaign. In 1980, the Prime Minister said that he expected by 1990 for Singapore to
“become a green shady city filled with fruits and flowers, a city worthy of an industrious
people whose quest for progress is matched by their appreciation for the beauty of nature.
Trees, flowers and birds within typical garden can soften the harshness of tarmac and
concrete.”
Thank you.
Dr Shawn Lum:
Hi good afternoon. It’s wonderful to see so many friends and also new faces here today. I
want to thank Mr Khoo Teng Chye for inviting me to participate in this lecture. When I saw
this email, first I thought, “No, you got to be kidding. Look at these VIP-type people and he’s
asking me.” So it’s frightening but at the same time, an honour and a privilege. Dr Chua is
the mentor of my mentor, Professor Lee Sing Kong. So again, just to share the stage with
you — it’s quite a privilege. So I thought, well since we’re in that vein, I thought I might make
a confession.
My first encounter with the Garden City came in 1989. I joined as a visitor at the Botany
Department at the National University [of Singapore]. And my mentor there was the late
Professor Hsuan Keng. And Professor Keng said I was here to study some mangroves, he
said, “You’re interested in the mangroves” (and I won’t try to replicate his accent, that’s very
difficult to do). But he said, “Oh you’re interested in the mangroves.” I said, yes, I am. He
said, “Well, here, take this number and call Lee Sing Kong and Yeo Meng Tong.” So I called
and Yeo Meng Tong was a younger landscape architect, just back from the US. And I said,
this was great, I am going to learn about mangroves. It’s a good fit with my topic. It’s going to
fast-forward, it’s going to help me in the learning curve. Then, I found out that actually they
needed someone to describe mangrove animals. And I’m a botanist. I still know nothing
[about animals], but then I knew even less. For two months, I read every book, learned how
to identify what’s an insect, what’s a snail, what’s a fish. This is a craft and now you know, if
you have been to Pasir Ris — the signboards thankfully are gone now — but all those
signboards of animals, the birds, the mangrove, night-time in the mangroves, I don’t know if
anyone saw those — I confess it was me, and I apologise for that.
By then I had already realised that there is a commitment to not only try to make something
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beautiful and to preserve a bit of heritage, but to try to share that with others. And I know that
many of you in this audience, I see Rosalind Tan, I see so many people who do it so much
better than me. I just want to talk to you about my own impressions in terms of how the
people sector, the NGO sector, have interacted with the various agencies in helping do our
part in achieving a “Garden City” and a “City in a Garden” as it is now. And along the way,
where is the synergy, and to be honest, sometimes there have been the occasional
difference of opinion. Hopefully, that contributes to a better place for all of us and for nature
as well. So these are the four things that I would like to talk about.
So here’s something from URA and NParks. The idea is to get people to participate in this
“City in a Garden”. Not just to make something nice for everyone, but something that we all
take part in actively. I represent the Nature Society. We are 60 years old next year and we
have about 1,500 members. We actually had our start in an even older group. We were a
regional group called the MNS — Malayan Nature Society. Today it’s spun off as the
Malaysian Nature Society. The way that the MNS was set up was that there were a number
of regional and autonomous groups of which we were the Singapore branch; and our
members and founders include very eminent naturalists, the late philanthropist Dr Loke Wan
Tho for example, and some of the most famous biologists in the region. And to think that I sit
on this thing and all these famous people came before me — is still quite intimidating. We
split in 1992, becoming the Nature Society. This is an interesting thing, I think, even with the
MNS, we started as a hobby group in the colonial era – birdwatchers, studied plants,
described orchids and everything. We weren’t a conservation group from the beginning and
we only kind of accidentally almost became conservation-oriented when these places where
people go birdwatching and looking at butterflies started disappearing. So this is kind of the
split identity we still, till today in my opinion, try to grasp with.
What are we? Are we a hobby group or are we an advocacy group or a watchdog? Are we
an education group? We try to do all of the above. Let me share with you a few areas where
we have worked and sometimes come into conflict with the various architects of the “City in
the Garden”.
First of all, in terms of planning and policy, one of the things that I’m very happy to say we
made a small contribution, is in 1990. My colleague, Clive Briffett and Ho Hua Chew, put
together what they call the Master Plan for the Conservation of Nature in Singapore. Those
sites that they recommended to be set aside because of their conservation value, some of
them got incorporated into Singapore’s first draft of the Green Plan, which was presented at
Rio in 1992, and revised and was presented at Johannesburg in 2002.
Another area that I think the story is oft told, is that members of the Nature Society by
mistake, stumbled and got lost, possibly. If Richard Hale were in the audience he might
disagree, because he was the first who stumbled upon this area called Sungei Buloh. It
wasn’t a very popular birding site then. I think then we would go to Senoko and other places
on the North coast, and it turns out that that was a very rich place for migratory birdlife. Dr
Chua [Sian Eng] was there; Parks and Recreation [Department] would know the story better
than I. This dialogue led eventually to the creation of what was called the Sungei Buloh
Nature Park under the Parks and Recreation Department, today the Sungei Buloh Wetland
Reserve. To say that the NGO played a small part in making this happen makes me very
proud to be associated with the movement. So there’s Sungei Buloh, an aerial view.
A few other things we do. We work with friends from the National Parks, on something called
the butterfly trail at Orchard — to try to enliven the shopping interest where you can maybe,
if you want to cool down, you want to make sure that you don’t spend too much money, go
out and look at some butterflies, calm down a bit, maybe then go back into the fray perhaps.
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We have managed with NParks to double the butterfly diversity in three years. Just by
planting a few butterfly gardens. Again, we turn to people like Rosalind Tan, and Khoo Teck
Puat Hospital for advice. How do you make that happen?
Another thing working with the URA and NParks is the Railway Corridor — to make it
something that all Singaporeans can be proud of. In terms of heritage, history, nature is a
unique and endearing landmark.
We also collect and share data. Some of the work we have done as part of a consortium
organised by National Parks in the early 1990s was to contribute to the first survey of the
catchment area. So some of us looked at birds, others looked at vertebrae, but essentially
that led to the first survey published in 1997 of the Central Catchment Nature Area.
Currently, we are also doing a monitoring of the eco-link area, in co-ordination with NParks.
Either side of the BKE, looking at animal diversity before, during, after construction of the
ecolink. So there is a data sharing thing that we do too. We are many eyes and ears, and
hopefully we can contribute to a national effort.
What are some of the challenges? Let’s try to think about this and I don’t want to take too
much time. But really quickly, I think when we talk about “Garden City to City in a Garden”, I
think one of the things perhaps that one needs to think about is, what is one’s concept of a
“garden”? And I think maybe looking at that context, that could explain some of these
differing views. Some of them want a nice, manicured garden. Others want a traditional, say
English-style, a Victorian garden. My colleagues want something that’s maybe a little bit on
the wild side.
So, here’s a map produced as part of the parks and water body plan showing the parks and
nature reserves on the island. Now if I show you a Google Earth image, you will see that —
well, again, what’s the kind of garden — I guess there are some intervening slides. This is
the original Singapore — all forest, mangrove, freshwater swamp. Within 60 years of the
discovery of Singapore by the British, well, not discovery, colonisation by the British, we
have been discovered much earlier obviously. But the nature areas have dwindled. There
were very little, much less greenery. Seven per cent of the natural forest. Everything else
has been cleared for agriculture perhaps. We are down to these four nature reserves, which
include Bukit Timah, Labrador, Sungei Buloh, Central Catchment. By the way, Labrador was
not set for the marine life. It was actually first set aside for this unusual fern, championed by
the late Prof. Hottum, who was also the guy who brought to you Vanda Miss Joaquim.
So, again, here’s the map. Here’s the Google Earth image. You can see there’s a lot more
green in this than the official parks and water bodies. And the reason is there’s a lot of areas
outside of NParks jurisdiction that’s green. So that could be the military area, it could be
abandoned kampungs (Malay for “village”) awaiting development in the future. There’s a lot
of wildlife in these areas outside of the NParks area. Now these are earmarked for
development.
So then the question becomes: is there any way to mash these views of what this garden is?
What kind of garden do we want to live in to achieve both a biologically diverse and rich
ecosystem that functions in many beneficial ways for us and for animals as well as
developing and making the city something that the whole world looks to? I guess that to me
is the challenge and how, once in awhile, occasional differences in opinion arise. Historically,
there was Marina South in the early 1990s, which is today where Gardens by the Bay is. And
more recently, Bukit Brown. You can see it’s a very green area, but it is earmarked for
development. I make no bones about it. But because of its proximity to the nature reserve
above, of Lornie Road in the middle and Bukit Brown below, it has just happened to be a
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haven for wildlife. Some rare birds come out of the forest to Bukit Brown. A Colugo actually
flew across Lornie Road, presumably because it’s there, and even rare butterflies. So the
question is, in the context of this overall greenery, a lot of people get very passionate about
Bukit Brown because it does have a considerable conservation value. The irony is that the
reason why this road had to be routed through the Bukit Brown Cemetery is because the
alternative would have been to eat into the nature reserve. So, it was kind of between a rock
and a hard place. Unfortunately, I think some elements of that difference in opinion got out of
hand a little bit, to say the least.
But still the question remains. Can we have a development and have greenery? And have
something that at least manages to, if you talk about nature as a stakeholder, appease the
various stakeholders involved? This is a new thing. Sometimes we’re redundant. Residents
will go and make their concerns known even without NGOs, for example, residents of
Braddell or Pasir Ris or Dairy Farm.
Now I guess the last thing I wanted to say — and hopefully we can address some of these
issues during the dialogue — is where do I see, both as an individual and as a member of
the NGO, the way forward in terms of the development of the “City in a Garden”.
I guess there are different ways of seeing it. One is to see a garden in a broad and
integrated sense. A very holistic system that has services, not just nice and decorative. And I
think Dr Chua was already saying that earlier on; Parks and Recreation went beyond just
making shade, making the city comfortable. They were actually trying to bring in a biolife as
early as the 1980s, very early in his tenure as Commissioner of Parks. Can we take this
further to bring in some of the services that ecosystems provide and calculate that, integrate
that into the conception of the concept of the “City in a Garden”? Can we think this as a
continuum of nature area to urbanised area and actually plan that continuum in a strategic
and systematic way? Is that possible? Can we develop a new generation of people who love
nature, know horticulture, are real experts and then can share that with the rest of Singapore
and beyond?
I guess the idea of a “City in a Garden” is not something that’s just pretty, not something
that’s just a wonderful concept, but something that kind of makes the migration, kind of
lodges itself somewhere here. That we know it, we feel for it and are going to do each in our
own way, something to make it even better. I do believe there is enough convergence
between the people sector and the public sector to really make this a garden that benefits
both people and nature, and I love to talk to you a bit more about it during the dialogue. And
again, thank you to the Centre for Liveable Cities for allowing me to participate in today’s
forum.
Mr Poon Hong Yuen:
So, “City in a Garden”. This is a famous photograph. By the way, we found out that this was
the only photograph in the 1960s of Mr Lee [Kuan Yew] planting a tree. This was 1963. We
tried to look for 1964, 1965, all the way to 1970 — we couldn’t find anything. Even SPH
didn’t have anything. So this photograph is actually very precious. So, in 1963, he planted
this tree and set Singapore along the path, along the journey towards a “Garden City”. And I
think by and large, I don’t think we’re being too modest to say that we’ve achieved this
vision. If you ask most tourists what is Singapore’s brand name, I think they won’t say it’s a
food paradise or a shopping paradise, actually most of them would say we are a “Garden
City”. I think we’ve earned that very nice name, and we should be very proud of it.
And I think Singaporeans in general are very proud of it. Because we survey Singaporeans
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every two, three years, and we found that around 70, 80 per cent of them are actually proud
for Singapore to be identified as a “Garden City”. Also, 70–80 per cent of them feel that
nature and greenery are important; parks are important [and] nature is important, even if
they don’t visit parks and nature areas. So the sense of identity for Singaporeans as a
“Garden City” is very strong.
So now we are going towards a “City in a Garden”. Some people, including Mr Lee Kuan
Yew, say it’s a play of words. We like to think it’s actually a two, three-notch at least,
improvement over the “Garden City”. Because we wanted to signify that we can do a lot
better. We should not be just satisfied with being a “Garden City”. Because many cities in the
world, in the region, want to be a “Garden City”. We should remember that we were the
original “Garden City” and to do better than these many aspiring “Garden Cities”, we should
aim to be much better. I think we can do it.
But I would like to say, first of all, that the “City in a Garden” vision is only possible because
of the great work that pioneers like Dr Chua, Dr Wong Yew Kwan and the giants did before
us. The work that they have put in place, the foundation that they have built for the “Garden
City”. Because if you think about it, many cities — I don’t want to mention names , but if you
can imagine cities that are very concrete, very built-up — even today, they wake up and say
collectively they want to be a “Garden City”. Actually there’s no way they can do it. Because
it’s already set. The hardware is already set. And the “heart-ware” is also set. The journey
that we took in 50 years is not just in the hardware, in the planting, the infrastructure. It’s also
the mindset change, the mindset that evolved over five decades. In the beginning, my
colleagues will be around and maybe Dr Chua can verify that people actually complained
about trees. “Why do we plant this tree in front of my house? The leaves are dropping. I
have to sweep the leaves so often.” They clog up the drain, mosquitoes… We still have
some complaints like that. If you cast your mind back to 1963, actually Singapore has no
right to dream of being a “Garden City”. We didn’t have enough jobs, not enough housing,
not enough food. But, Mr Lee, I always say, if we have Facebook back then, maybe we
wouldn’t have had a “Garden City” because people will be criticising the government for
daring to do something like that when we didn’t even have food and clean water and
housing. But we did it. I think it’s over the years and now today, just now I mentioned that the
people who complain about trees, today if we cut down trees even for good reasons, people
will complain. To us, those are very good complaints because it shows us that people have
accepted that it’s a very important part of our identity.
Now, “City in the Garden”. I won’t go through our six strategic thrusts and our 20 initiatives,
but let it suffice to say there are three key pillars to a “City in a Garden”. If you ask me what it
means, I will say that we are looking at a city with pervasive greenery. I will explain a little bit
more about these three things in a while. We need to be a city with a very rich biodiversity
and also, a garden that is owned by the community. Let me share a little bit more.
Now as I said, our “City in a Garden” dream is built upon foundations of the “Garden City”.
So on the left, you see that we have built basic parks, very nice parks that people enjoy, do
exercises. But we thought why not take it up a level or two.
Dr Chua mentioned Pasir Ris Park. I don’t know how many of us are old enough to
remember when the big playground in Pasir Ris Park opened, I remember that parents from
all over Singapore, not just Pasir Ris, would bring their children to Pasir Ris Park to play in
that super-duper playground. It is sort of a destination in itself. So we thought, why don’t we
have more of these? So it is not a totally new idea, but it is a concept that we really want to
develop.
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And if you think about Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park today, the one with the meandering river,
again it is a destination park because parents want to bring their children there to play in the
river, to experience the biodiversity there, to learn about the biodiversity there. So this is
what we want. And these three parks we have identified as destination parks.
So just to give you an example, Jurong Lake Park is next to Jurong Lake. A problem with
Jurong Lake Park is that the water table is actually very high. So when it rains, you get water
ponding, or flooding, whatever you call it. It’s more ponding than flooding. So the usual thing
to do would be to solve the problem by putting earth on it and raising the ground. But we
thought, why not make use of that terrain issue, carve out islands next to the lake, and
create what we call, thousand-island adventure playgrounds. So what you see in the picture
at the top, is supposed to be that, right? Flying fox, bridges and all that for you to do islandhopping for the children. But I suppose adults can also play.
Admiralty Park, similar issue, also a terrain issue. Because if you go there, it’s a very hilly
park right. So not very much you can do there but we thought, why not carve big slides into
the slopes so that it will be a slides wonderland. In fact, we are thinking some of the slides
may be so big and so wide that the whole family can hold hands and slide down together.
So, ought to be very exciting.
East Coast Park — in many ways, already a destination park. It has I think more than 10
million visits a year, just to put it in context. It is the biggest and most popular park in
Singapore. But funnily enough there is no playground in East Coast Park — I don’t know
whether you realise [this]. So we want to build a bit more play element into it, maybe spread
out the commercial areas a bit so that people can have a better feeling of space. We think
just when you think you cannot improve upon East Coast Park, I think we can do so.
What you see on the left is our famous streetscape. You know that we have about 1.4 million
roadside trees, each one of them numbered. We like to say, because we take care, we want
to record them into our database, and make sure we record our maintenance record. If you
think of the current streetscape, they are all more or less monospecies — raintree, raintree,
raintree, raintree. That’s how we used to it, Dr Chua? In those days, when we wanted to
green up quickly, that was the best way to do it. But as we went along, we discovered that
we need more biodiversity, we need more colour, and that’s why you look at the photo at the
bottom, Central Expressway, it’s almost like a forest, layered planting, and that’s very
deliberate because first of all, it enhances the robustness of the trees, so that one disease
that affects one species will not wipe out the whole road. Secondly, we also found that birds
and wildlife actually prefer this layered planting, so they can jump from tree to tree. So
actually this will help to attract birds, butterflies and wildlife.
Tampines Avenue 5 is another example of clustered planting in a more natural planting that
we put in place. We had one that’s along Kheam Hock Road and that is really gardening on
a city-wide scale. Shawn showed you Bukit Brown. Bukit Brown links up MacRitchie and
other green areas. We thought, how else could we link up MacRitchie and Botanic Gardens,
which are two very rich green areas. So we thought let’s plant up the streets, the areas
between it. The only problem is, we can plant along our streetscape, we have control over
that, but at some part of it, it runs into the residential estate. So we decided to talk to the
residents at Kheam Hock and get them to help us plant up their gardens and the roadside
estate so that there’s continuity. Lo and behold, when we met up with them, they were so
keen to come together with us to do it. So, it’s a really nice project. If you go there, you will
see the nature-way is doing very well.
Dr Chua also mentioned the park connector network — PCN for short. Right now, we have
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around 230–240 kilometres of PCN. Many loops. But, again, having a PCN allowed us to
think bigger. So we thought, what’s the biggest loop you can do in Singapore? Well, we
thought a round-island route. A route that goes around the island. So if you look at the map,
there’s a red line that goes around the island and the green part is East Coast. Around 150
kilometres long, it will pass through many attractions — nature attractions and otherwise. It
will be, I think, a new dimension in recreation in Singapore. Imagine a 150-kilometre cycling
route. You can actually do a two-, three-day expedition with farm stays and all that. It’s
possible. Who would have thought that such a thing could be possible in Singapore? I didn’t
show in this map but of course, the Rail Corridor that runs from North to South. We hope, if
you notice a URA person sitting beside you, please give them a nudge, we hope to have a
continuous cycling track. Because the North-South so-called Rail Corridor is continuous.
There are no roads that cut through it. So imagine a 24-25 kilometre cycling track that is
seamless. Very nice. You can do another nudge to the URA guys.
Biodiversity. It’s very important for Singapore. Many people do not realise how rich our
biodiversity is. For example, in terms of hard coral species, tiny Singapore actually has onethird of the world’s species. Whole world’s species. Tiny Singapore. That is something
unfathomable. In fact, we have about 40 per cent of the number of species as the Great
Barrier Reef, which in itself is already I don’t know, a few hundred times the size of
Singapore. So very rich. And in terms of bird species, we have about half of what the UK
has, about half of what the whole of France has. So very rich in tiny Singapore. And why not
make use of it? So the people before us have done a lot of work in the nature reserves. And
that’s why there is this rich store of biodiversity. But we thought, actually we can bring this
biodiversity closer to people and also, bring people closer to this biodiversity. So, we will be
looking at bringing a somewhat flagship species out into the places where people work, live
and play.
The hornbill, the bottom left photograph, is the most famous example. Around more than a
hundred years ago, they were still around. Then when the British came, like what Shawn
showed you, they planted plantations, got rid of the forests, and the hornbills were driven out
of Singapore. They were effectively extinct in Singapore. A few years ago, some came back
and we decided to help them re-establish in Singapore. So we built artificial nest boxes.
There are not many natural tree cavities around [for such nests]. We have to have artificial
ones. Boxes with a cavity inside. We found that they really like the nest boxes. So today, we
have more than a hundred hornbills in Singapore. About 60 in Pulau Ubin and 40 on the
mainland. They are still growing, which we are very happy to see. They are beautiful birds.
The other species we are looking at, the magpie robin, Dr Chua mentioned this, that’s the
black and white bird in the bottom right corner. Beautiful bird. Slow loris, top right corner.
Otters, we also have otters, which is quite amazing.
But the most important thing about the garden is that it has to be owned by the community. I
guess in 1963, it was one man’s top-down idea. It worked to a large extent, but going
forward, it has to be not just one man’s vision, but it has to be shared by the rest of
Singapore. So, we have tried to do a lot in terms of engaging the community. For example,
our “Community in Bloom” programme. Currently we have 600 community gardens in
Singapore tended by people in residential estates, in schools, factories even, commercial
estates — 600, not a small number. But we are challenging ourselves to increase this
number to 1,000. I think when Singapore has 1,000 community gardens all run by bottom-up
energy, passion, it will be a different Singapore.
Kheam Hock nature-way, I spoke about this just now. Interestingly, Kheam Hock is a rich
man’s area, a landed estate. When we talked to them, they came out to do planting together.
They were so happy, and some said, “Look, before NParks came, I didn’t even know who
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my neighbour was.” Maybe the house too big, cannot really see your neighbour. But with this
planting, they came to know their neighbour, and a bit of the kampung [Malay for “village”]
spirit came back. Which I think is great. So sometimes we look at the community spirit in
HDB estates, actually we need that in the so-called rich man’s area too. Right? Because it is
also part of Singapore.
In terms of community, well, what we try to show on the picture in the left, NParks officer
doing work. What we don’t want for “City in the Garden” is only the NParks officer doing
work. Of course we continue to facilitate, continue to work with the community, but what we
want are more the things we show on the right. For example in Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park,
there’s a group of about 20 volunteers, I understand they are MediaCorp staff, who help us
do horticultural work, which is unusual in Singapore. We are probably one of the more
advanced in terms of [government] agencies, in terms of engaging the community for
volunteerism. We have about 900 active volunteers, but most of them do guided walks,
educational outreach, the usual thing that Singaporeans like to do. Not many Singaporeans
like to do horticultural work — breeding, cleaning up the river. But this group we are
experimenting with in Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park, they are interested in it. And we want to do
more. We want to have more of such groups, so that Singaporeans will literally roll up their
sleeves and mend the garden for us.
Also the bottom picture I would like to show, which is basically volunteers doing inter-tidal
research and also helping us to do what we call marine biodiversity surveys. Why I want to
bring up this example? When it comes to gardening, I think most people have the idea that
it’s done by retirees, old people. I think it’s not quite true, but there’s a bit of truth in that.
Gardening tends to be done by the more mature people. But when we call for volunteers for
nature conservation stuff, there’s a lot of young people [who show interest]. And that’s what I
love to see. Even when I give talks like this to schools, to universities, to the polytechnics,
actually during the question-and-answer session, many of them will ask me, “What can I do,
what can I do to contribute to the effort?”. and that’s lovely to see. The generation that
people criticise, who always just set up online petitions — that is the extent of their activism.
I think it’s great that this is an area that young people really want to do something about.
This is the Bishan-Ang Mo Kio example I was talking about. The other example is Morning
Greeters. It’s a very ground-up initiative. This group of young people go round the parks,
especially Bishan Park, to greet people in the morning. They just run around in the morning
and greet people, and bring a smile to people’s face. It’s a bit intangible but they are very
passionate about it. They even set up a Facebook page. You can search for it. They update
the page quite often. I think this is great, because what we want to see is we have the green
areas, we have the parks, we have the assets, it is for people to make use of, to connect
with the rest of community. Because all said and done, a park is also a community space.
Challenges. I don’t have slides for this. I’ve been quoted in the papers to say that well, our
top three challenges are space, space and space. Again, a nudge at the URA people. It is
true. Our biggest technical challenge is space, or the lack of space. URA will tell you that is
true. There are many competing uses of space. So even as our population increases, we
also need to have a lot more green space in order to give people a sense of “spatial-ness”, a
good living environment, and this is very important. Remember, more than 80 per cent of
people think that parks, greenery and nature are important even if they don’t visit it. Just
having the park and green space there gives them comfort, a psychological relief. So it’s
very important. But it’s very challenging, we know. And URA has been very supportive. We
want to thank them. And we have to think, I think, out of the box. Not just ask for more space
from URA, we also have to maximise what we have, make the best use of what we have, so
that we have good-quality green spaces in Singapore.
9
But that’s our biggest technical challenge. Because if you dig deeper, actually at the heart of
it, is actually the hearts of people. Because what do people really want, right? 99 per cent of
Singaporeans want more spaces for shopping malls, then the URA probably will have no
choice but to allocate more space for shopping malls. But if more people want and value
green spaces, then I think there can be a conversation about how much or having more land
allocated for parks and greenery. So that’s why I say the biggest technical challenge is
space, land, but actually at the heart of it is what people want.
So, with that, I just wanted to say maybe two things. This is our Facebook page. If nothing
else, come and like us. Secondly — I feel like a traveling salesman — we just launched this
book the past weekend. It talks about our journey for the last 50 years and what we hope to
see probably in the next 50 years. I think you can find this in major bookshops. So, do buy a
copy.
Q&A session, moderated by Prof. Neo Boon Siong, former Dean of the Nanyang
Business School, NTU
Prof. Neo Boon Siong:
While the panelists are getting their seats, some of you will be wondering what has a
Business school professor got to do with all this, moderating the session amongst our
pioneers and leaders in greenery?
It was really quite a coincidental development. One day, I think it was 2006, I got up in the
morning and saw the headlines in The Straits Times that we are going to spend close to a
billion dollars to build a garden in the city centre, on prime land, on reclaimed land. And that
the billion-dollar budget did not include the cost of the land. I couldn’t believe it. I thought we
had gone crazy. What happened to Singapore? This must be nuts. So I began to enquire —
what are we up to, why are we doing this? I got my Civil Service College colleagues
interested and then spent close to a year talking to a whole range of our pioneers in
greenery as well as the staff in NParks. I probably had the most fun case study I have ever
done. I met a group of extremely passionate people who really believe in what they are
doing. Deep convictions. For once, for the first time, I really realised how much I have taken
it for granted. The greenery that we have enjoyed in our streets are, oftentimes not realising
it until we take a trip overseas, come back and realise that this is a different city. So I really
enjoyed it and went on to do two detailed case studies. In fact we are finishing the third case
study on biodiversity. So that’s how I got involved and that’s why I’m here.
I’m going to pose a round, or maybe a couple of rounds of questions to the panellists. And
then after that we will open the floor. Let me go back to the seat.
Let me start with Dr Chua, since you spoke earlier. Dr Chua, at the time when you were the
Commissioner, from what I understood talking to you and other colleagues of yours, the
Parks and Recreation Department was really very under resourced. How did you manage to
accomplish with so little?
Dr Chua Sian Eng:
Well I think in the beginning when we first started the Parks and Recreation Department, we
had very little money for the development of parks, because the first impact that the Prime
Minister wanted was to green up all the roads, and also, for the urbanisation and also the
housing. When these trees were removed, he wanted us to replant them. So I think most of
10
the planting was done by HDB, because the Parks Department does not have to do the
planting at statutory boards, only in government institutions. But later on, I think as the
Department expanded to the development of parks and all that, I think the Prime Minister
wanted the Ministry of Finance to provide more money. Because the thing is, he realised at
that time, if you plant the trees and shrubs and you don’t maintain them, they would die. So
you need money also to maintain these trees and shrubs that were planted. Also, once we
developed the park, then you have a lot of grass areas and they have to be cut. So
contractors have to be paid to do this. But I think in the end, the Ministry of Finance did give
us the money.
Prof. Neo Boon Siong:
Well Hong Yuen used to come from the Ministry of Finance. An engineer by training, but
when you hear him speak, you probably can’t tell right? In fact, I think that will be an
appropriate question for you to address, perhaps. Given your technical training, your finance
economic background, how would you describe or characterise for us the economic value of
greenery for Singapore?
Mr Poon Hong Yuen:
By the way, for the MND and MOF people in the audience, NParks today is still under
resourced. Okay next question, right? How to put an economic value on greenery. I think it’s
very difficult. I know some people out there are actually working hard to do that. Even
internationally, people are trying to put a value on what they call, I think what Shawn
mentioned, the ecosystem services. Wendy is nodding her head. Even in NParks, some
people, like Wendy, are very passionate about coming up with some economic justification
for greenery. I think the work ought to carry on. I think it’s a very important work. If we can
make strides in this direction, it would be really great. But I always caution people like
Wendy. When I was sitting in MOF, I often get papers and proposals with similar concepts.
Put an economic value on pollution, on clean air, clean water. Very well-meaning. I think if it
helps us to understand the context of the issues, of the problems, I think it’s very useful. But
we cannot rely too much on them. Why? Because for a person who is evaluating the
proposal, if the number is very small, meaning the value is very small, we will say, “See I told
you so. It’s not an important area. So I don’t have to allocate much resources to it.” If the
number is very big, I will probably say “Look, it’s because of your assumptions. It’s too big to
be believed, it’s not realistic.” After all, you know these numbers — if you just change some
numbers, the assumptions, you can come up with very different figures. So we ought to be
quite careful.
But, again, just to make myself clear, it’s not that I don’t think it has any value to it. I think if it
helps us to understand the problem, the magnitude of the problem, I think it’s helpful. But
just that we cannot rely on it to make very mechanical decisions. Because like I said, if Lee
Kuan Yew had waited for economic justification, economic value to justify his decision, we
wouldn’t have gone for Garden City. It’s his gut. Actually this morning, my Chairman
[Christina Ong] was telling me, “Did you know that Lee Kuan Yew justified greenery by
saying that it was supposed to retain rainfall?” I said I know, in fact if you read his books, he
had many, many reasons to justify greenery. So my conclusion, I’m not speaking on his
behalf, I don’t know, I’m just speculating, I think he liked greenery. His gut, his heart told him
that greenery is good and then he found reasons to tell people this is why he did it. So, you
heard this before, “I did this to attract investors.” Right. You say, yeah right. He said he went
to the UK and he found that in London, for example, only the rich areas had nice greenery,
the poor areas did not have nice greenery at that time maybe. He said “No, no, Singapore
cannot be like that. So for me, Singapore must have greenery all over. So that’s another
11
justification. We want people to have nicer, more ambient temperatures. There are so many
reasons. I think in the end it’s the gut. So if your gut tells you that look, this is something we
need to have, then I think more or less, you will want to do it. And if you can find reasons to
justify it, so much better.
Prof. Neo Boon Siong:
Thank you. Shawn, you mentioned earlier in your presentation that there were times when
you had differences with the agencies in trying to promote nature. When did you decide to
persevere and when did you decide to go along with the decision? How did you decide?
Dr Shawn Lum:
I was hoping to ask you for advice on that one. I guess there is, you often hear, and I don’t
know, not having grown up here but having lived for 25 years here, I always hear that there
is a Singapore context. There is a Singapore way of doing things. You don’t do things, for
example in terms of activism, you don’t take a confrontational, contrarian approach. But you
go in at the right appropriate moment in an appropriate way to make one’s point. And I see
the value in that. I’ll give you a quick example. I think there were two incidents that I made
brief mention. Both in the early 1990s. One was the Marina South. On that reclaimed land,
there had been some ponds that had accumulated. And quite a number of rare birds had
come to that area. The Nature Society had called for some ways of preserving the birdlife of
Marina South. Now here’s where the story diverges and Dr Chua would know, it’s like
Rushamon, everybody has a different version. One is that the Nature Society was actually
unreasonable, that there was reclaimed land with great value, and it wasn’t even a nature
area; it was the sea, and the birds just happened to come. Now to make a ridiculous point of
calling to preserve reclaimed land, which is a non sequitur… The other interpretation I hear,
which could have partly been a misinterpretation, was that it wasn’t so much of people
asking that this reclaimed land be set aside as a nature reserve or anything, but rather if
there is to be park land in the Marina South anyway, would there be any chance of either
incorporating those ponds into that park, or somehow, building a series of ponds that the
birds might oblige and move over until wherever the final park is to be sited. They will not
only have greenery, but birdlife.
There is probably an element of truth to both of those. I have to admit. So on the one hand, I
do agree yes, there is probably a more conciliatory and positive approach to these things.
But at the same time I think there is a fundamental belief. Mr Poon referred to this, what
does your gut tell you and your heart tell you? For many people, and I think again, they are
not incompatible. Earlier, I used to hear, even three years ago I spoke in this auditorium and
somebody asked me, “Nature Society are you for government or are you against
government?” Well no, it’s for nature — that’s what we are.
So the question is, for many people, whether you are a developer, or a civil servant, just a
regular scientist or just a regular citizen, I think to see wildlife, to see nature, to see wild
nature is meaningful, is enriching. It’s not just about saving birds but it’s about making life
that much more wonderful and magical. So then comes the challenge. How do you convince
people that yes, nature is compatible with a highly developed fast-paced modern landscape?
There is a way both scientifically in terms of engineering, in terms of public outreach, in
terms of policy to align these up so that the best possible compromise can be reached.
Because of the clout that we have as an economic engine, people who work overseas and
have a big impact not just here but all over the world, can produce a knock-on effect that’s
really going to benefit people the world over. To me, that is one of the challenges.
12
Prof. Neo Boon Siong:
Thank you. Very tactfully said. Sian Eng, maybe let me come back to you again. The plans
for greening were formalised mostly in the 1990s. There were no formalised greenery plan in
the earlier years, particularly the time when you were the Commissioner. How do you make
progress without a plan?
Dr Chua Sian Eng:
I think this one, we worked very closely with URA, and URA designates certain areas to be
developed as parks. Also when they have development for housing, I think they have the
open space. You have the smaller gardens, which are called the open spaces developed. So
actually, not say that we don’t have a plan, because first URA would designate certain areas
that we can use as parks [and] these will be the green lungs for Singapore, especially next to
housing estates. That’s how Ang Mo Kio, Toa Payoh Parks were developed. And also Pasir
Ris because at that time, the housing development were starting in those areas. So actually,
in a way the plan was determined by URA. We, as the Parks Department, was the agent to
develop these parks. And we get the money from the Ministry of Finance, which we have to
put up our budget for every year, because before that, we already know what are the various
areas going to be developed as parks.
So it’s not true that we don’t have a plan because we work very closely with URA in those
days. The chief planner will do all these things for us. Also, we worked very closely with the
roads branch of PWD [the then Public Works Department], because new areas develop and
roads would be built and we would do the roadside planting for them. So, in a way, these
were already done by URA for the whole urbanisation of Singapore. So, as I said, it’s not
true that we don’t have a plan.
Prof. Neo Boon Siong:
But it was an overall land use plan, not a particular Green Plan as such. The Green Plan
only came out in the 1990s. So you are right in the sense that there is some planning, but
not a specific plan for greenery as such.
Coming to Hong Yuen again, as I mentioned earlier, things that really are significant for me
when I look at how we have developed over the years, mostly the people of NParks and its
predecessor organisations. A very unusual agency, very unusual culture, very unusual
people with deep conviction and commitment. When you came onboard a few years ago, it
was probably a very unusual civil service or government organisation. How would you
characterise the importance of the type of institution and the development that we were able
to make in terms of greenery? The culture of the institution, the people, the commitment of
the people?
Mr Poon Hong Yuen:
Organisationally, actually we have very unusual organisation. If you look internationally,
there are not many organisations like NParks. Even in the more developed countries, you
have one organisation taking care of the nature reserves, another organisation taking care of
parks, maybe the city council look over the roadside trees. They don’t have it altogether. We
are very rare that we have it altogether, which is very important for a city like Singapore
because we are able to do integrated things. So the nature-way that I was talking about is
basically linking a nature reserve with streetscape, residential planting to a botanic garden,
which in a different country will be done by four different agencies. How do you get it
13
together? But we can, we can do it easily actually. So I think in terms of organisational
structure, we are unique.
But you mentioned culture. Actually, as you ask the question to Dr Chua about not having a
plan, actually I think, sorry if I contradict you a little bit, I think it is quite true or at least half
true… even today, because we take pains to tell people that our “City in a Garden”
framework is not a plan. It’s a framework. Meaning there are six strategic thrusts, and every
year we can review, and the things that we want to do inside a framework could change. In
fact, we have launched it for about two years, and we have a few major pieces inside that
were not in there in the beginning, and that’s perfectly fine. Because I believe in NParks,
there is a very strong culture of getting things done. I think from the very beginning, it was
like that. Mr Lee said plant this tree, it’s done. It’s a very valuable culture because
sometimes people say that, why don’t you do a study on the effect, or the ecology, before
you do something? It’s possible and I suppose scientifically, it’s the right thing to do. But the
approach we prefer is get it done then study. Rather than study, then get it done. Because
the study may take years.
Our style is a very strong culture, just get it done and then we monitor. If it works, we roll it
out even more. If it doesn’t work, then we just keep quiet and roll it back. I think that
describes in a sense, the Singapore public service culture a bit. Well, but I’ve been through a
few government agencies and ministries, I think that sort of culture is very strong in NParks. I
think it’s possible because of the strong passion that you can see in our people. I think, I will
gush a little bit, our people are really fantastic. I suppose that type of culture of getting it
done may not work if people don’t feel so strongly about what they do. But our people feel
very strongly about what they do.
There’s once a person, one business executive who told me, Poon I would like to be NParks
Chairman. I said why, he said “the people you have, I think if I slash everybody’s pay,
everybody’s salary by half, there will still be 20 per cent of NParks officers who would stick
around.” I said, think about it, actually that is quite true. And those are the type of people you
need to get things done quickly rather autonomously and still nothing major goes wrong.
That is very important.
Prof. Neo Boon Siong:
Maybe let me ask you, Hong Yuen, to comment a little bit more. NParks work with NGOs like
Nature Society and others way earlier than other agencies. It has worked with individuals,
with communities much earlier than other agencies have. How do you explain that?
Mr Poon Hong Yuen:
Well I claim no credit for it. It started way earlier than me. My predecessors. I think, well, we
are unique in another aspect. In all countries, education is very important, for example. If you
say that I am doing education, nobody will argue with you. You sound very important. If I tell
people I am in the armed forces, security is very important, nobody will argue with you. But
only in Singapore is greenery that important. Only in Singapore is greenery pursued with
such, I would say, almost with a missionary zeal. It is something that we don’t want to take
for granted because what we do, we know. NParks we know are important. But we want to
make sure that everybody else knows that it’s important. So that’s why we always felt that
we have to go out to the community to seek buy-in. if I were doing education, I won’t need to
go out and tell you look, education is very important. But since we are doing something that
we feel very strongly about, and we need buy-in, we needed to go to the community.
14
I suppose the second reason comes down to the passion of our people. It’s a bit evangelical,
if I may say so, they feel so proud of what they do. They love what they do so much that they
have to share it with people. That comes very naturally from our guys and so that’s what we
did. Same thing with Nature Society. Sometimes I suspect I’m running an NGO myself. In
fact some of our guys come from NGOs. So actually, we do have quite a bit of likemindedness with the NGOs and the nature groups. But at the same time, of course
recognising that we are a government agency and we have the responsibilities of a
government agency. We play the bridging role. But we understand where they come from,
so we are very comfortable talking to them. Not always been so. But I think once we started
to talk, I think especially from Dr Tan’s time, then we felt that we could understand each
other very well.
Prof. Neo Boon Siong:
Shawn, you hinted earlier that Nature Society may have a different vision for the “City in a
Garden” that is probably more natural, less landscaped. But you did not really elaborate on
that. If you had your way, what would you do differently?
Dr Shawn Lum:
It is quite a tough question. No, I do think there’s synergy between and it’s not a question of
whether we have a manicured landscape or do we have a wild landscape. But I think and I
do agree with Mr Poon in that Singapore’s a nation of doers. So we do.
But it’s not, I don’t think it’s not just do and not study. There is this wealth of knowledge out
there, some of it generated here and some of it overseas — and they are scientific
principles, ecological principles that one can use to one’s advantage in designing that
landscape. There will be the manicured areas, there will be the core-nature areas. The
question is, how do you treat that landscape so that you are maximising the different sense
of place, the cooling effect of greenery, the aesthetic, the cultural as well as the biodiversity.
I do think that if I had my way, I guess we will have more rainforests in place. Not that we will
do this at the expense of human habitation, or anything like that. And I think maybe in some
ways, we in a nature community and perhaps our colleagues at National Parks and
universities, maybe we don’t get across some of these feelings, the convictions clearly
enough.
So I’ll give you an example. Now that there are plans for the construction of an estate in
Bidadari and there is to be quite a sizeable park. It just so happens that much of the
woodland there might be used for housing. I mean no issue in the sense that the nation’s
development needs take precedence. But at the same time, this woodland as well as
woodlands near the Jurong Lake District and other places have birds that are only temporary
residents. They come during the migratory season and they move off. They either go North
for their breeding or South for the winter. But it turns out that these are forest birds and not
shore birds that could go to places like Mandai. It’s not a case that you clear this, they’ll just
go to some other place. I think the thing is that these are animals, and they have been doing
this migration for god knows how many tens of thousands of years. I mean it’s really a
miracle of nature that they come so far and every place along this flyway, has a role to play.
Even tiny little Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan, the Philippines — these are all stopover points.
So maybe it’s not a debate about what do we do with it, but how does Singapore provide this
home wherever it may that is appropriate so that we can continue to play this integral part?
We don’t want to be the weak link, break the chain, and this millennia-old migration is
15
stopped on account of we didn’t really apply what we know about the natural history of these
organisms. I don’t want to be the people that blew it and I don’t think that we have to be. It’s
just what do these birds do? What’s their value both locally and internationally? What can we
do in an integrated landscape to fulfill their needs as well as meet ours? And so, I think we
can first start with these principles and see how they can be implemented.
Prof. Neo Boon Siong:
Thank you and thank you very much for all your frank answers, Shawn as well. Let me now
open the floor to you. We have a very distinguished panel. Put up your hand, and when I call
you, just say who you are, where you are from and your question or comment. Make it short.
Anybody wants to start?
Mr Liak Teng Lit:
Just to start the ball rolling. Dr Chua, it is such a great idea to plant fruit trees. I would have
loved to get free fruits — a regular supply. How come the whole thing just gave up?
Dr Chua Sian Eng:
Well I think we started from the [army] camps and then the housing estates. Actually after
planting, we are not able to maintain it because it’s a lot of manpower involved. So we
passed it on to residents’ committees (RCs). I do not know why they couldn’t co-ordinate
among themselves to get the fruits and distribute. Maybe they found it a bit too much of a
chore. So eventually I think the RCs gave up the idea.
But the trees are still there, except the ones that a lot of fruits that dropped. And they get
rotten, flies come in. So these trees were removed. So, actually we, the Parks Department
did the planting only for them. The whole idea was the Prime Minister wanted to inculcate
social discipline and they wanted children to respect public property. And that was the
reason why he wanted the fruit trees to be planted. So we did that and then of course, we
passed it on to the residents’ committees to manage it. So after that, I do not know what
happened with the RCs.
Mr Poon Hong Yuen:
It’s not totally gone. Sengkang Riverside Park actually is a fruit-themed park and there are
many fruit trees planted there. Only thing is the fruits usually don’t have the chance to ripen
so they get harvested way before. Unfortunately, people are a bit impatient or maybe they
think that “If I don’t harvest it today, somebody will harvest it.” So I think there’s a bit of
education as well — we try to tell people to wait a while, be a bit more patient. But it’s still
going on. But it’s more manageable in a park. In the streetscape where the span of area is
so wide, it’s a bit difficult to manage. Also if it’s a roadside tree, sometimes you read in the
paper, there are some disputes as to who should be getting the fruit. But it’s not dead. It’s
not done in a major way I suppose, but it’s still around in some form.
Prof. Neo Boon Siong:
Actually the contrast is quite interesting when we try to do it from the government’s side. The
fruit planting, it didn’t work out quite as well. But Hong Yuen just mentioned that we have 600
Communities in Bloom gardening clubs from the ground. Now the RCs are the ones who
want it. It’s not initiated by NParks. It’s initiated by the residents. And many of them grow fruit
trees as well. I think that’s a good lesson for us. Doesn’t always work because government
16
initiates it. In this case, if I think I heard you the last time, you have four or five people staff
supporting 600 community clubs who are really focusing on gardening and fruit trees.
Communities in Bloom. I think what a fantastic achievement that is, primarily because the
role of the agencies changed in supporting, being there as a resource and helping it, making
it work. Am I correct to say that?
Mr Poon Hong Yuen:
Yeah, I mean the staff strength for Community in Bloom team hasn’t grown for many years.
Although now we have 600 community gardening groups, and that’s possible because like
Prof. says, we are able to be the facilitator. We train them and then they go off and do their
thing. When they need advice, they come back to us again. From there, we observe the
groups. If they are good people, good gardeners, good leaders, we also appoint them
ambassadors. Community in Bloom ambassadors. Some are very old. There’s a very old
auntie and there’s a very young boy in his teens. Quite a number of ambassadors and they
go out to see gardening groups. And they do the work for us, so it’s really quite fantastic.
Then once in awhile, we organise sessions for them to come together to share gardening
tips, to encourage one another to keep going because sometimes it’s not easy. And that’s
how it has grown to 600. Actually I told my guys I want to grow it to a thousand with the
same staff strength. They say “Ah, cannot be done.” So finally I increased a bit of the staff
strength. But it’s largely the same team, same number of people who have done it from zero
to 600.
Mr Alan Hwee:
Good afternoon, my name is Alan Hwee from Green Bag. We make compost from old trees
and I just want to have an observation with regard to the city. The financial centre that we
have, I find that it’s a bit too concrete. I walk from one point to another point, I can’t find any
trees. Doesn’t have any shade. And all nothing but buildings. But we have done very well in
parks, HDB, housing estates. This is what we are lacking. The reason why I said this is
because I saw the word, “City in a Garden”. That’s all.
Mr Poon Hong Yuen:
Okay I don’t know which stretch you are talking about. I think in general it is true we are
facing pressures in terms of space for planting. We are always trying to get more space for
planting. If you look at, for example, don’t talk about city centre. Even the Kampung Java
stretch, ironically, outside or maybe quite appropriately outside the LTA [Land Transport
Authority] headquarters, because of road widening, from a very large landscape we have
come to almost quite a bare and concrete landscape.
So that’s out of necessity. Now I must say that LTA in general works with us very closely to
try to retain greenery as much as possible. But sometimes it’s just very difficult. If you need
to widen the roads, then you just need space. And we try our very best, even when you talk
about very narrow strips, we try to plant something. But it’s not always possible.
So I do think moving forward, we need to think a lot more out-of-the-box, so we are prepared
to do things that we have never considered doing. So just to give you an example, we are
now contemplating taking over some of the maintenance of greenery from some other
parties. For example, the MRT operator. We have always told them that look, you need to
plant trees [at your MRT station] and you need to maintain them. But you know what? That’s
not their core business and frankly, they don’t care very much about greenery. I mean, truth
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be told, they don’t do it very well. They don’t have skill as well. But sometimes we look at it,
look this MRT station could be just next to a park. Why can’t I just take over the
maintenance? Maybe you still pay me and then I will look at it. I mean, it’s just something
that we’ve always said no. But I told our guys we really need to think out-of-the-box because
if we really want a “City in the Garden”, we really need to do things differently.
What we don’t have is space. We are running out of it. But certainly we can work together
with all stakeholders to ensure there is some quality in what we have left, make the best of
what we have and then still, achieve our City in a Garden vision.
Mr Raymond Kwok:
I’ve got two questions. The first one is, are there a planning perimeters in terms of how much
greenery there should be within a space? The second one is that, I think you have been to
the city, I think you have been to StanChart, there is a wall with a lot of plants and the recent
one I think ITE Headquarters. Can you share with us what is the concept? Are we going to
integrate planting [outside] the building?
Mr Poon Hong Yuen:
There is a working plan with URA, again there are planning perimeters for green spaces per
1,000 population, we are supposed to have a certain number of hectares of park space.
That’s just for parks. Then in the recent point paper, we also talk about having 85 per cent of
the population within 400 metres of the park, which is not bad, considering that actually if
you take out landed estate, we are probably already more than 85 per cent. If you go down
to HDB estates, everybody has green space, right? So actually for us to achieve a high
percentage people within easy reach of parks is very possible. Are we always able to reach
it? Well it’s a very dynamic thing, as you would understand right? It’s not as if the population
stays where it is and we just run after the fixed goal post. Sometimes the goal post gets
further and further and we just have to sort of chase after it a bit. But, we do have the
perimeters and we try to achieve them. So that’s for planning.
The second question was on the skyrise greenery. Actually, I have been around a few
places in the world to look at skyrise greenery. Even in some cities where they claim that
they are like for example, some cities in Germany claim that they are the rooftop greenery
capital of Europe or whatever, but frankly I look at it, our skyrise greenery compares very
well. I realise I am not being that modest here. But really we compare very well.
Couple of years back, we had the skyrise greenery international conference that we
organised with some international green roof association or something, and international
delegates came, and as usual, we had learning journeys. My staff told me jaws collectively
dropped because of the quality of our green roofs. Not only those few that you talked about,
if you want to note down, there’s this green indoor garden in 158 Cecil Street. If you Google
it, if you look it up, it is absolutely lovely. It’s out of this world. And it’s a commercial thing. If
you look at, I think you’re talking about, is that 6 Battery Road? Where they have the Patrick
Blanc wall that costs a million dollars. And it’s actually very interesting. These nice green
walls. They are done, as I said, with commercial considerations. Not because we gave them
money, but they were renovating very old office buildings and they realise they have to
compete in a market, they have to have something very distinctive. So they came up with a
quintessentially Singaporean, a very beautiful green space inside a building, outside a
building for the tenants to enjoy. So, people are willing to pay higher rents.
To me, that is great. That is the best virtuous cycle we can create. You know, the business
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professor nods his head. Because you know if we have government subsidies, government
exhortations, it can only go so far. But when the businessman sees that it makes dollars and
sense to have green walls, then I think we’ve reached the stage where it can be selfperpetuating.
But I must say, why do I say our green roofs and green walls are very good? Because the
quality is excellent. And the HDB green roofs are actually very good. The ones that we saw
in Punggol, actually you can’t even tell it’s green roofs. You think it is what we call true
ground planting. But they are actually on top of carparks. Right now, they have a lot of green
roofs on top of carparks. And they are excellent quality. But, sometimes I think it’s the
Singapore pride. When we do things, we want to do things very nicely.
Actually, I’m encouraging also our guys to also look at what the Europeans call the extensive
types of green roofs. Meaning they just leave the space there and weeds just grow. It’s
alright because it’s a naturalised green roof. So I think we can have both. We can have what
you call very intensive green roofs and green walls that people look at, marvel and feel
inspired to do more. But there can also be the extensive type of green roof that you can just
slap there, and it helps to achieve the benefit of cooling down temperatures and greening
the environment, and you don’t have to spend so much effort and money to build and
maintain. So we can have both. So if you ask me, we have only done one half. There’s a lot
more we can do in skyrise greenery. So I’m confident we can actually even aim to be the
skyrise capital of the world. It is possible for us to do so.
Ms Shelly Siew:
My name is Shelly. Shelly Siew. Please excuse me for bragging, but to be credible, I’m here
actually to speak as a private resident of an estate in Singapore, and the winner of the Best
Garden competition a few years ago. So, my problem is, labour shortage. Whilst you have
challenges in cleaning estates and parks, I observe that many of our cleaners are
outsourced. Because they are outsourced from third-world countries, how do we know that
they are here to clean according to the expectations and levels of our global city? I know
because I watch the cleaners, they come, they use the blower, they pollute with noise, they
pollute the air. They blow the leaves. A few minutes, they walk off. They don’t gather the
leaves, they don’t put them in bags. Of course, over a few days, the leaves are scattered
again. Over the days, you have more and more leaves being scattered. I want to know
whether they are properly trained here how to clean, and whether there is supervision to
make sure that the cleanliness is enforced. The cleaning is enforced. I would like to know
that please. Thank you.
Prof. Neo Boon Siong:
I think we hear you, but it is not a cleaning panel. It’s a greening panel. So you don’t mind, I
think probably the right agency will be the NEA. Am I right? Because it’s street cleaning.
Rather than NParks. I think it’s not a fair question for the panel.
Ms Shelly Siew:
It’s parks. Parks cleaning.
Mr Poon Hong Yuen:
Well it’s a good point. It’s a challenge obviously. Frankly, we are looking very seriously at
insourcing because you are right, we probably outsource a lot. We want to see whether we
can do some of these things ourselves, so as to have a certain benchmark and standards.
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But that’s aside. In terms of training, yes, I would say in fact, but we may not do it perfectly,
but John Tan is there. He’s the President of the Industry Association for Landscaping.
But I would say compared to many industries, we are recognised as having done more in
training. That’s why two, three years back, we received an award from INSEAD and MOM
[Ministry of Manpower] for our training system. Because we don’t just train our own people.
We have a centre to train our own people but we extend the training to industry as well. We
have seen the industry has started to realise that training is very important. We may do that
much training in cleaning, but we do training in horticulture. So we realise that even the
foreign workforce is an important component for our industry and we need to train them. But
like I said, we are still learning. We don’t do it perfectly. But we’re trying. This is not
something that we don’t do at all.
Ms Ria Tan:
Hello, my name is Ria. I’m from Wild Singapore. I think some of the panellists know me. I’m
crazy about marine life in Singapore. We have an amazing marine biodiversity. So I was
wondering if I could hear some thoughts about how to extend these ideas of “City in a
Garden” to beyond the high watermark well towards the reefs, and seagrass meadows and
mangroves? Thank you.
Dr Shawn Lum:
Actually, Ria, we should look to you for some of the answers to that one. But I must say
there was something quite interesting with regard to this. I had a colleague who had a
student who did a study of an odd community. It’s just outside the new waterplant. It’s next to
the Sungei Bedok and the Sungei Ketapang. When these water backs out at high tides into
the canal system, and it just so happened that some of these longkang [drains] had the tiles
broken. So in the middle of Tanah Merah, there was this community. There were
mudskippers, I mean of course it’s within the tidal flow. But to go to Bedok and you look
down, there’re mudskippers and mudcrabs and fiddler crabs and all these things you think
you will have to go to the beach to see them, and they are there. And it just seems so out of
place. Then I just thought well, these animals do come. It’s just a matter of how can we
integrate it some way into our living environment. So a lot of times we do, nature groups take
people out to nature, the other thing is, how can we bring it in? It’s possible and if you really
think about it, many parts in Singapore the tide no longer reaches because we’ve managed
to turn these intro reservoirs. But there are still many places in vast areas of the island,
where it is still possible to see the tide. Then it’s the question is how do you maybe give
access, make it safe? But still, then they have the interpretation and the support, and to get
people to overcome their intrinsic uneasiness I guess of co-existing with nature.
I think, if I could use that to maybe comment earlier on Mr Poon’s comment on skyrise
gardening. Again that’s the idea. How do you have a basic infrastructure that provides a
service? A longkang that transports water, a skyrise garden that is cooling and aesthetically
pleasing, without actually subtracting from the functionality of it, but then adding the
biodiversity component. You have not done anything that makes the building or structure
impractical, but you got the education and the biodiversity part comes into it as well. Maybe
with skyrise gardens, but not so much if I had my way, I think this could be a real reservoir of
insect life if you could get people to accept insect life, like bees, which are quite harmless
actually. They cannot only live on the rooftop garden, but when they decide to forage, they
go to the wild areas to do their pollination. So they could be performing a very important ecoservice, function.
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The other thing is we need the buildings. The StanChart building was mentioned. It turns out
that a lot of these things are like the death star for migratory birds. I’m not saying they are in
Singapore. But what I am saying is we haven’t done. We haven’t looked at the subtractive
effects of much of our infrastructure on nature. Let’s understand, do we have this issue? A
guy spoke in Toronto, his record in Toronto. Two buildings, six hours, 500 dead birds. They
just kept slamming into this building because they did not know. They thought they were just
flying through trees and sky. They hit a glass building.
So is this an issue in Singapore? If it is, there are very easy ways to remedy it without
actually compromising the integrity and aesthetics of a building. I guess it’s about
knowledge, looking for the win-win, sorry it’s a cliché, and then getting people to appreciate
it. So there’s always going to be a few people like Ria, myself, and a few others who love it.
But then there’s the question, how can we make that another simple pleasure in life for the
4.4 million other people living in Singapore? And god, what a happy society it would be if we
were out there and celebrating nature together.
Mr Poon Hong Yuen:
Ria, sometimes I have some of my old staff asking me the same question. When we talk
about green, how about blue? How about marine? I tell them it’s the same thing. Green is
shorthand for nature. Actually some of my staff I suspect are planted by Ria as agents to ask
those questions.
To us, we already do a lot for marine. We can do a lot more I guess. Many of you would not
know, actually we have what they call coral nurseries. You know nurseries right, you put
young plants. We actually plant corals in the sea and then we sort of translocate them to
different areas in Singapore to plant them. So we do planting of corals as well. We also do
surveys of our marine life and another reason why I say the two are one is, in many ways,
the two are actually integrated. When you talk about mangrove planting, the Sungei Buloh,
actually you are also talking about marine biodiversity. When you look at the river in BishanAng Mo Kio Park, you are talking about blue or rather, water biodiversity in the middle of a
park. Of course, we have swamps, we have wetlands.
So to me, there’s nothing to say that we leave this out, we leave that out because it’s selfdefeating. It’s all the same. In any case, the kid that holds the sea cucumber in his hand
when he goes to visit Chek Jawa, feels excited about nature in general. He doesn’t think that
this is marine biodiversity, I’m not interested in plants. It’s all the same. When we get people
excited, whether it’s the sea cucumber in his hand, or a hornbill that flies past, it’s all about
nature. And that same kid, depending on his inclination, which side of nature, will want to do
more for nature in general.
[Unnamed]:
I’m actually an urban designer with CPG Consultants. As I sit here and listen to all the
experts, I see that there is a focus from NParks talking about something like a “City in a
Garden” in the sense about trees, about management, maintenance and everything. And I
see from Shawn, talking about biodiversity and rainforests. So I see a big difference. Do we ,
as we move forward, even say in Singapore with the White Paper, do you see these things
really coming together? Or actually more apart? Because for you and parks, it’s more about
really maintenance and managing all these resources with the competing land uses. You
have the authority and you can make decisions. But you are talking about something
greater, trying to connect people to nature and all those larger issues. So moving forward, do
you really see these things coming together? Or actually diverging further away from each
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other?
Dr Shawn Lum:
I think actually both things are happening now. I mean starting already from Parks and
Recreation time, I think there was an effort not just to green Singapore, but actually to add
biodiversity into it. I think if you look at Mr Poon’s presentation, it showed that streetscapes
are now done in such a way to an extent that they mimic an ecosystem and the layering —
what you will find in a natural situation. So in terms of managing the landscape, it is a little bit
more ecological say than it might have been, as we learn about these components. So that
is actually happening and I hope it will continue to happen as well.
The flipside of it though is, it’s almost futile if there’re a few people in a statutory board and a
few nature lovers and marine experts getting excited about these things but there are five
million or six million other people out there for whom this landscape is just taken for granted.
I think that for me would be the challenge, which is how do we successfully engage the
community in a meaningful way, in a non-dogmatic way? To realise it’s beautiful, it’s got
benefits, open your eyes you see wonderful things that really make life that much more
meaningful. It’s there and it’s a question. I think we as a NGO, maybe haven’t done a good
enough job in making that connection. I think if there’s a divergence, it’s not so much a
divergence from a statutory board and a NGO type thing, but how do we get this pool of
people who are resource persons and to take some of that zeal or passion or joie de vivre
and be able to pass that onto other people. Again not as in the way like nature because it’s
good for you, but when people see it for themselves. I mean, when we’re kids, what’s the
first thing we get all excited about? It’s birds, it’s insects, it’s flowers. Somewhere along the
line, we lose it, and it’s about reconnecting with that. So I think it’s an awareness issue
largely, and it’s about bringing everybody, putting us in a common mindset.
Mr Poon Hong Yuen:
I see the two as not that different frankly. What you call nature and managed greenery.
Actually we manage the nature reserves as well. In the sense that we always have to
monitor the state of the nature reserves and when necessary, do enhancement of natural
habitats as well. We don’t just leave everything alone. Especially in the context of Singapore
when we’re talking about urban biodiversity, we’re talking about urban ecosystem. If left as it
is, without NParks, there would be very little greenery in the urban setting. All you have,
even if you leave the nature reserves alone, would be the nature reserves.
But that would not work in the context of Singapore. In the context of Singapore, the two
needs to be seen as one. Look at what we’re doing in terms of nature-ways, we are actually
connecting the fragmented pieces of nature areas using our urban network of greenery. If we
did not have the urban network of greenery, the nature areas will continue to be fragmented.
So it doesn’t pay to look at them as separate entities. They are actually one and the same.
They contribute to the same thing.
Our thinking in terms of park management, park development, has also evolved over the
years. The last two years, when we went out to ask people, survey people what they like to
see in parks, surprisingly or unsurprisingly, one of the top three things that come back was,
they like to see more nature in parks, which is wonderful. I don’t know if they mean nature by
clumps of trees or real jungle, but I think what people are saying is we don’t want too much
manicuring, which is fine by us. So as we develop, or redevelop the larger parks, we will try
to leave more larger areas naturalised so that people still have the nature setting. You still
have a playground, play areas, but nature setting. And that’s what we will do more. So it’s
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not one or the other. We will do more managed greenery in nature and also more nature in
managed greenery.
Ms Chang Yan:
I’m Chang Yan, a principle planner of Jurong Consultants. I think Singapore is very blessed
with abundant rainfall and that really helps us to achieve this Garden City, much more easier
than the temperate climate. I have two questions. In the early days, we have many more
raintrees and they have been planted along very major arterials and highways. They really
give a very warm, romantic feeling as you drive through. But now I think it seems like in landscarce Singapore, I don’t see many of these raintrees being planted anymore. So I would
really appreciate it if NParks could rethink about replanting raintrees in many of these major
roads because it really gives a very lovely feeling when you come home from Changi Airport.
The next is that, is there any scheme to really designate roads which are slow-moving traffic,
so you can let these raintrees with less pruning, so that the branches may even reach to the
other side of the road? Like in Taiping Botanical Gardens, it’s such a beautiful scenic drive
when you’re in Taiping Botanical Gardens.
Mr Poon Hong Yuen:
Okay, raintrees. Well it’s not that we stopped planting raintrees. You are right, we probably
can only plant trees like raintrees that have a large crowns where we have space. Otherwise
it will be too constricted and stability will be an issue right? Trees with large crowns also
have large root bases right? Correct, Dr Chua? Okay just checking. So where we can, we
may plant raintrees.
But in a way, we are trying to do with more biodiversity and planting of more native trees.
Many people do not realise that actually raintrees are not native to Singapore. They are
brought from Latin America, South America. So it’s actually a migrant that has done very
well in Singapore. I compare it to the Chinese. We are migrants but now we are all over the
place. So but now we try to plant more native trees, more diversity, so that we have multilayered planting, so that we have richer birdlife, butterflies, good insects and wildlife. Well,
whether we designate roads for less pruning, actually you mentioned East Coast Parkway.
It’s a very, very lovely road.
Ms Chang Yan:
Mandai Road.
Mr Poon Hong Yuen:
Even Mandai, Upper Thomson, those are really lovely stretches that we will try to keep for as
long as possible. We are under pressure all the time. But fortunately Mr Lee Kuan Yew is
very fond of East Coast parkway and he says, preserve it at all costs. So one day you might
find us chaining ourselves to the trees to prevent road widening.
But I agree with you, some of these roads are really in a sense, gives Singapore a very
unique identity. We are very proud of East Coast Parkway. When Norman Foster was in
Singapore giving a lecture, somebody asked him what do you think is the most iconic
structure in Singapore? And he mentioned the road leading out of the airport, which is of
course East Coast Parkway. If you go to all other airports, you go out, [it’s] warehouses, [it’s]
dilapidated, it’s barren, ugly. And you just want to close your eyes and open it half an hour
later when you get into the city. But in Singapore it’s different.
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I still remember when we had the Youth Olympic Games, I think one football team, one
African team, was playing against Singapore team, youngsters. Apparently, the press
detailed their arrival from the airport to their hotel, and apparently they were so dumbstruck
by the beauty of East Coast Parkway. These are African kids you know. So from Norman
Foster, world-famous architect to African kids who probably have seen nature, but this is
something that is unique to Singapore and something for Singaporeans to be very proud of.
I’m really proud of what NParks has achieved over the 50 years. It’s unique and actually with
this very rich foundation, I really believe we can achieve so much more.
Dr Shawn Lum:
I will start with the raintree and I promise I won’t go that long. But it’s just, there is about
things that we build or make that you can calculate the loading on a building or a bridge or
something. I think there’s a little bit or something known about it. We have engineering
solutions too but I do think for things like trees, animals, wildlife, there’s a kind of
unpredictability about it — and I promise I will talk about the raintrees — which makes it
sometimes difficult to convince other people to feel that view.
And I’ll give you the example of Admiralty Park, It was just a month or two ago. A very tragic
accident where a raintree failed and it happened sadly, tragically, to kill a young man who
had a bright future to look forward to and everything — dreams, family, the whole lot. It was
a tragedy. But then you did hear then all of a sudden, people calling for National Parks,
“what are we doing with all these big trees? It’s a danger.” So, a monkey bites a child, or
maims a dog, and now “let’s call AVA and get rid of these monkeys.” It’s a real challenge —
how do you maintain this objective view about things but also try to keep in mind this public
safety and how do we not overreact? I mean honestly, the chances of dying of a shark bite
or snake bite or stonefish bite are so much less than crossing the street. But there’s the
element of the unknown that makes it kind of terrifying. When there’s a storm, when there’s
an accident, when there is a wildlife that runs amok a little bit, how do we keep this
conversation temperate and even, to the extent possible of a rational one? I think in another
way, aesthetically, a raintree is wonderful and I totally agree with you, it supports the wildlife
and see what it’s like to eat the fruits of it. But what do we do when that raintree falls on
somebody and how do we keep the argument going? So we should not cut all of them down,
but to take a deep breath, a step back and think what’s the overall benefit nature greenery.
How does it make it a special place?
Prof. Neo Boon Siong:
Thank you. I think you would agree that we are all citizens, residents are indeed much
blessed by the fact that we have so much greenery, and 50 years of it. The greenery story of
Singapore is really one of my favourite cases. I teach it with pride to both the civil servants
as well as to research leaders. My interest in the green story is also about the governance
part of it, which I think I’ve addressed. But let me end by perhaps, a few takeaways for
myself. I think we can also take heart to it.
If you look at the development of greenery, 50 years ago, in 1963, where Singapore was at,
there’s no logic to it. Without a leader with a strong conviction, this thing wouldn’t have
happen. And I think that would continue to be true even today, in many other areas. If we
follow only the trends of the day, we will never achieve greatness in any of our policy areas.
Secondly, if you look at the earlier developments, particularly in the 1960s and 1970s and
even the 1980s, where we have a great vision given by the Prime Minister at that time, but
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really we were learning by doing. Experimentally, mistakes I think Hong Yuen talked about.
Those that don’t work, stop. Those that work, do. That’s pragmatic, purposeful
experimentation. That has laid a tremendous groundwork for our subsequent ability to exploit
that further through a “City in a Garden”, through the Green Plan and through others. I think
we must not forget that in many of our policy areas that we have very little experience and
knowledge, we probably would have to take the same approach and not to trust too much in
formal plans and procedures which we may not know.
Thirdly, we may find that a vision achievement like this cannot happen without the institution
and the set of institutions behind it. That’s why I wanted Hong Yuen to describe a bit about
NParks and its predecessor. But it’s not just about NParks. It’s a URA. It’s a PUB. The ABC
water project. It’s the LTA. It’s the whole set of government institutions working together that
I think allowed us to achieve what we did. It is not just a single individual. Lee Kuan Yew by
himself would not be able to do this, even though he had a vision, but a set of institutions
that I think have carried us through and continue to be what really would allow us to make
greater achievements.
And finally, if we look at what we can achieve with very limited resources, and I believe Hong
Yuen when he says that even NParks is under resourced. They have been under resourced
for 50 years and continues to be. But look at the achievements. Look at what we have been
able to enjoy, as citizens and as residents here. Look at the amount of innovation and
creativity that has come out despite the fact that we are under resourced — that throwing
money at problems alone may not always be the answer. Working with NGOs in the 1970s
was probably not such a good idea. Because civil servants, they did it. Working with the
community when it was not such a vast word at that time. But doing it with deep conviction,
passion and despite the fact that there were not enough resources pool together, work with
whoever can put their effort, their money as well, providing donations, giving us a kind of
environment that we have and the quality of life that we have here in Singapore.
Please join me to thank our panelists, Dr Chua, Mr Poon and Shawn Lum, for the wonderful
presentations and their comments.
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