Strengthen Communities

This study reflects the public’s view on the minimum income standards in Singapore for living spaces, facilities and services, safety and maintenance, and community life. It will also gather data on minimum expectations for heritage and preparedness for an ageing population. The study’s findings can be used as a guidance for identifying priorities in allocating public resources, as well as benchmarks as we continue to have conversations about the future of our neighbourhoods.

This study will investigate both newer platform-related jobs (such as delivery and private car hire), as well as traditional gig work (such as the creative industries and professional freelancers). Data will be gathered through in-depth interviews with 100 gig economy workers, divided between different industries and occupational groups. The study report will address pathways into the gig economy, examine work conditions and implications for security, highlight the strengths and gaps in current regulations and social provisions, and propose directions for policy change.

The Singapore Futures Lab is envisaged to serve as a key node for educating Singaporeans on crucial governance challenges of the future, through research as well as engagement with interviewees. The Futures Lab will focus on identifying insights leveraging tools and methodology applied to public policy and governance issues in Singapore, South East Asia and beyond. The futures and foresight studies, applied to the Singaporean context, can strengthen Singapore’s ability to stay prepared as a nation for future trends and challenges, thereby “future-proofing” Singapore.

This study will investigate the intersections between the low-wage economy, social policies and the COVID-19 crisis, and their impact on Singaporean households living in poverty. Data will be gathered through two waves of in-depth interviews with 60 low-income households six to nine months apart. The study report will lay out the consequences of the crisis for economically vulnerable households, highlight the strengths and gaps in social policies, and offer recommendations for future responses to similar health crises.

The COVID-19 lockdown around the world has resulted in unprecedented effects on families that the world does not fully understand. Amidst common belief that spending more time together may increase family bonding newspaper reports have revealed that the lockdown has actually led to higher divorce rates in China. This study will make use of an existing framework and data that has already been gathered prior to the pandemic, to compare it with new data post-COVID-19. Results of this study explores the effects of COVID-19 lockdown on families in Singapore. In addition to that, the study will also gather and look into data on marital satisfaction, and quality of relationships between parents and their children.

Governments around the world have faced two related challenges in their efforts to respond to the spread of COVID-19. First, the epidemiology was constantly changing and evolving which impacted the efficacy of the policy response with profound implications for how many lives would be saved and lost. Second, experts often disagreed about the approach to deal with the crisis owing to different implicit moral philosophies pertaining to pandemics as a policy problem.

This study aims to systematically assess lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic for managing future outbreaks. It will address following two broad questions:

1. How might the most appropriate and effective institutions designs be developed in advance of the next global pandemic?
2. How can governments and international processes deliberate over, and resolve, competing moral philosophies about how to engage different types of expert advice well before, rather than during, the next pandemic?

The disruptions caused by COVID-19 in the global food supply have greatly affected both supply and demand in all countries. Countries that depend on imports, like Singapore, are particularly more vulnerable.

Singapore relies on the international market for 80-90% of its food supplies. Its food imports from neighbouring countries, particularly Malaysia, have become problematic in recent years. As a result, China and the United States have become increasingly important in Singapore’s food supply diversification efforts. But the overall stability of the global food systems rely heavily on the outcome of the ongoing contestations between the United States and China.

This independent research will study the impacts of COVID-19 on food supply chains domestically; lessons on how Singapore has coped with the superpowers; what have been their policies towards international food trade and investments; and the actual and potential impacts on Singapore. The study targets to serve Singapore’s policy makers and practitioners, as well as academics, as it provides an understanding of scenarios for Singapore’s potential food sources and food supplies in the future.