Integrating Human Capital into National Development Planning in Singapore

Modernizing the economy and achieving prosperity required building and harnessing Singapore’s human capital. The government charted a new path for Singapore, adopting a fast-paced industrialization strategy to create employment for an unskilled workforce and generate export earnings. Implementing...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Global Delivery Initiative
Format: Brief
Language:English
Published: Global Delivery Initiative, Washington, DC 2020
Subjects:
Online Access:http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/288331595613626022/Integrating-Human-Capital-into-National-Development-Planning-in-Singapore
http://hdl.handle.net/10986/34212
Description
Summary:Modernizing the economy and achieving prosperity required building and harnessing Singapore’s human capital. The government charted a new path for Singapore, adopting a fast-paced industrialization strategy to create employment for an unskilled workforce and generate export earnings. Implementing that plan required overcoming fundamental challenges such as ethnic tension, high unemployment, regional instability, and turmoil caused by Britain’s withdrawal from the former colony. From these difficult and uncertain beginnings, Singapore would attain the highest score of any country in the world in the World Bank’s 2018 Human Capital Index, which took into account several health and education indicators. This delivery note examines some of the strategic decisions and policies that contributed to Singapore’s success.