My Professional Profiling

Synopsis


The topic that I have selected for this project would have a greater approach on awareness and informing rather than informing to my audiences on a well established company/industry or on hospitality events here in Singapore. I have specially selected topics on awareness as it reminds those who forgets and teaches those who are unaware on problems that Singapore is facing or even the threat that is about to come. My main objective for this project is to promote an ever changing society through commitment and struggles for a better future for all because as a son of this nation, I truly believe that Singapore can be strong yet beautiful nation. Strong and beautiful not in terms of power and wealth but in the hearts of the people more importantly. Changing every Singaporean into a responsible and thoughtful people would have a greater long term effect on the country rather than just making use of the authority to achieve the same goal. To illustrate, if you want a bag of rice from someone, the responsible and thoughtful way of getting it is by striking a deal by doing him a favour or trading, or the use of power where you show him who is stronger, than fool him to think that you will be his protector hence deserve the bag of rice. Most certainly and generally someone would say that the first way is wiser and healthier; however as human, when facing the real situation, our nature of greed, self-centred and possessions take control of ourselves and end up making the mistake which is the second way. Hence to solve this problem, the only way is to consistently remind each other regardless of our status, race or religion, to practice responsibility and righteous deeds and learn from our past mistakes to try to eliminate it as far as possible. As we have seen, Singapore is able to achieve great heights in a short period of time, overcome tough challenges along the way too. With the hard work of people before me, I see that it is my responsibility now to step up in the upcoming generation to continue work of the people before me. And I hope this piece of message can be useful for all.


The Signs


Observing the signs can be very useful tools because it helps to indicate to us our position, from it we can than determine the changes that needs to be done.


On top of that, the signs along with logical reasoning would also help strengthen the case that I am bringing forth.


In the signs section, I would like to discuss signs or symptoms that has come about to show the position that Singapore is in by comparing her with other developing nations. I would like to show the similarities that Singapore share with other leading nations and why many leading nations are facing the problem of declining Total fertility rate.
From the source was gathered from various websites which has in majority agreeing that the total fertility rate of the world is currently declining. Surprisingly within the south East Asia region, Singapore has the lowest fertility rate.


As we go to the west Europe region, developed countries they are also facing the same problem of declining birth rate. France 1.8, England 1.6, Greece 1.3, Germany 1.3, Italy 1.2 and Spain 1.1. As we have known those are also developing countries like Singapore(1.1). The question is why developed countries facing this problem.


Now if we were to shift back to East Asia many of the developing countries are also encountering this problem. Japan 1.2, South Korea 1.22 and Hong Kong 1.04 the developed nation in East Asia are all facing the problem too.
The pattern that we get here is why many developed countries encountering the problem. Experts have point out their views that although a developed country is recognised as countries that have a high level of development according to the Human Development Index where it comprises of three elements. They are Life expectancy, Literacy/Education and Standard of Living. Unfortunately under these criteria, the Human Development Index does not include the fertility rate of the country to indicate the strength ability of the country. Furthermore the fertility rate can also provide a systematic prediction of the potential manpower of the country.


The main question is although these developed countries are considered to be leading countries as compared to the developing countries and third world countries, in percentage wise the developing countries are suffering the greatest, a large proportion of developed countries is facing the problem and as time goes by the number is also growing. Hence one should seriously consider the logic behind this strange happening. Another important point to note is what is going to happen next.
In the study of fertility rate, a student who major the topic can confirm with us the seriousness of declining birth rate. Examples are extinction of culture, lack of manpower, slow development rate, affect the safety of citizens and increase the threat of being over ruled and many more. Stating this awareness might not alarm the people because the public would not be convinced that these statements are true unless more and more people are taking it into consideration as well.


Factors Affecting The Problem


The subject for my project is on declining birth rates specifically in Singapore. I chose to study on this topic because it might be the interest of the government to consider for the nation to prosper. Looking at labour force issue externally one can directly question why is Singapore highly dependent on foreign workers instead of local workers. However to clearly understand if Singapore really needs to highlight this issue as a concern to all, the case needs to be serious to a large extend.
There are various factors that can directly or indirectly contribute to the declining birth rate in Singapore which would then lead to other problems. This piece of work is dealing with a chain of problem one related to another hence the approach might not be specifically targeted at one field but the inter-related field which is needed to be reconsidered.


Verily we have known that Singapore is a labour intensive country where manpower is needed to maintain the rate of development of the country. A part of my research is to discover “the threats that Singapore might face when being too dependent on foreign workers?”, “why does Singapore need more and more foreign worker?”, “why hasn’t the benefit of incentives implied showing any improvement to the fertility rate?”.


Point number one, “the threats that Singapore might face when being too dependent on foreign workers?”. Dealing with the first point, the straight forward question can be answered that when Singapore is being too dependent on foreign worker, firstly it would meant that without the foreign workers Singapore will not be able to maintain the manpower needed to run the country. Hence without realizing we can no longer generate local manpower to run our country, and if a conflict were to break out between Singapore and a related country which provide us with their labourers, than the crisis of shortage of labour will occur. Hence we have to seriously look into this matter for the future of Singapore.


Point number two, “why Singapore is needing more and more foreign worker?”. The reason is because Singapore is struggling to increase its fertility rate to a position where she can maintain her culture. Currently the fertility rate of Singapore is at 1.1 for every female in Singapore considering that they lived to the end of their childbearing life. With the figures of 1.1 Singapore is ranked at 220, 1 being the highest fertility rate.


A documentary on fertility rate shows that in a research done, in order for a culture to maintain itself for more than 25 years, the minimum required fertility rate must be at least 2.11 per family and anything less the culture will decline. According to history, no culture has ever reversed once it reaches a fertility rate of 1.9 and if a culture reaches a fertility rate of 1.3 it would be impossible to reverse, it is because it will take 80 to 100 years to correct itself and during this time frame, the culture would have already suffered great lost and would be at the edge of extinction.


The very reason why the fertility rate here in Singapore is consistently declining for the past several decades is because we have already fall below 1.3 which is a state where the rate is irreversible and the rate will continue to drop until it ends. Knowing the situation that we are in and considering our probable future, it is definitely time to turn the table around and change the whole system. Sadly I know that in a short period of time major crisis that is unexpected will happen because the research has clearly shown our position. What will happen next no one knows but research is telling us that Singapore will experience setbacks we have never seen before as the setback is the down fall of the nation. Regardless of how advance and developed we can be, with a high standard of life, equipped with science and technology, once our platform crumbles everything else will fall too. A very simple example would be in the existence of man where he can be knowledgeable and wealthy, however the more basic requirement as a human would be food, water, air and shelter. With these elements the man can have energy and move, he can than work and learn to gain wealth and knowledge. We can say that the man is in a sane and stable condition, however to display Singapore using this example, we can say that the man has already achieved wealth and knowledge previously however because he was smoking too much, he suffered stroke where his body can never recover and he will be in that state for the rest of his life at the same time his body will also deteriorate. Being at that state, the best thing to do is to create awareness to others on the dangers of smoking meanwhile he is still alive because there is nothing that he could do to reverse the process so he can help to remind others instead.


*Things to note: two of the three points are on labour force which is indirectly related fertility rate. I emphasize on labour force as it will
help show how serious the problem is and how closely they are related.


Point number three, “why hasn’t the benefit of incentives implied showing any improvement to the fertility rate?”. Certainly in today context, it is normal for a Singaporean to think that having more than two child is going would have to spent a high cost for the child’s expenses in school and daily requirement until adulthood, hence parents would give a deep thought regarding family planning. There are more than ten reasons why Singaporeans to not choose this benefit, however I would only provide 3 reasons along some explanation. First reason economy situation, second reason increasing ideology of career mindedness, third reason shared culture.


Currently the economy of the world has been unstable. Firstly it would affect the World Bank, next the world, because the World Bank is controlling the majority of the world finance affair. Hence, this problem is not only affecting us Singaporeans internally but the outside world as well. When the world economy is unstable, it would cause the family planning of a couple to change as well. This is because the world that we are living today is dealing a lot with money. Especially here in Singapore, we use money daily, so money is a great importance to for us in our daily life. Now that it is known to us the importance of money and how much we need it, it is understood that the stability of economy can greatly affect decision making for family planning. It would now be clearer to us why couples are having problems to have more children. Since the world economy is generated by the World Bank, Singapore has totally no control of the gains and drops of the economy, this simple logic that is stated here is unavoidable because we are a part of the system. If the World Bank falls, the system will also fall, and if the system falls, the economy in Singapore would be chaotic.


Experts who study on history have discovered that the World Banking System is a dangerous idea, because its concept is similar to putting all eggs in a basket, hence putting every single one at stake. Instead of this system, the better way could be putting the power house regionally or independently. By doing so the world can still work together and at the same time not risking one to the other. The reason for it being carried out this way is because the World Bank has its own agenda according to the expert.


According to the Straits Times breaking news that was published on the September 28, 2009, there was an article on declining fertility rate. The title was “Fertility Rate Still Falling”. In there was a comprehensive observation of the Singapore’s declining fertility rate which was measured over several years or decades. Also on the same article, there was some additional information on increasing ideology of career mindedness. The article states “The report also found that higher-educated women have fewer children than lower-educated women”. And as we have known from today’s strong implementation on education would meant that more and more Singaporeans are moving towards career oriented majority. Being career oriented is a good choice to achieve greater heights in life. However if we were to link the observation on the article and the rising number of career orientation, it shows that firstly the good news is that Singapore is maintaining its education standard consistently, however the bad news is that according to observations higher educated woman have fewer children as compared to lower educated woman on an average, hence we can still see the same issue persisting in different angle.


Conclusion


At the end of the day after realizing the seriousness of the problem, as Singaporeans, no matter who we are, where we come from, what our status are, regardless of our race, language or religion it is the responsibility of all of us to achieve our common goal.


As the government have known and experienced that the incentives which they have provided has not convinced Singaporeans to have more babies, they have to further investigate what are the other factors that constitute to the problem and from there they can start to troubleshoot the obstacles.


From my experience which I gained from talks, I remembered during a speech from an expert who was discussing on world monitoring system, that today’s development concept is not balanced because the world that we lived today is very demanding towards what the world can provide. For example, the people from the past have learnt that if you were to take the goods which were harvested, then they must give time for the new crops to grow and for the soil to be fertile. In today’s context, the rate at which we are ripping off the goods is far too quick and time left to replenish is too short hence causing the imbalance effect. Observing closely, this could also be the reason that Singapore is facing today. As we observe from our past back in the late 80s the fertility rate of was a good 2.1 which was a stable figure, little that we have known that even during that time Singapore was developing fast, hence as time goes by the figure keeps dropping as people would give a second thought to have more children. The example here is similar as Singapore was ripping the goods and opportunity that she has however at the paste we were moving we neglect on harvesting back what was taken. As of now, most of the goals have been achieve, however when will we see, get or experience the good part of life that we have worked for?