18 SAFEGUARD: A PLACE TO LIVE Safeguard a place to live SAFEGUARD NURTURE CHERISH 19 20 SAFEGUARD: A PLACE TO LIVE “At the end of the day, if you want the sky of Singapore to be always blue, the land of Singapore to be always green, the water to be always clean, the public health to be always pink, it counts a lot on these many faceless heroes in MEWR, NEA, PUB as well as many faceless heroes in the industry and the workers in the environment sector. We have good people in MEWR and NEA. They know their jobs well, and they know the challenges we face. They are passionate and committed to meeting these challenges. Most of all, they are prepared to adapt to changing circumstances so as to meet new challenges with new mindsets.” — Lim Swee Say, Minister for the Environment (2002 - 2004) Snapshot. Singapore in the 1960s. Streets were more often than not cluttered with all kinds of refuse. One could see discarded tyres, bottles, nets and unidentifiable waste floating and choking up streams, canals and rivers. The water would be black, and stenches were often released. Right next to sawmills, workshops and factories, residences would be found, and people would live amidst the dust, noise and unpleasant smells. In a matter of decades, a complete transformation had taken place. Singapore had become clean. So much so that it is something we hardly think about today. Clean air, clean water, clean land. These do not come by accident. When Singapore gained self-governance in 1959, it inherited a heavily polluted environment, especially in the core of the city. In the outskirts of Singapore, there was severe land pollution following decades of dumping untreated refuse in swamps, coupled with liberal use of pesticides such as DDT to prevent mosquito breeding. At the same time the new government grappled with urgent issues such as housing needs, unemployment and high crime rates, it also began to look into eradicating and controlling pollution through appropriate planning and zoning of land use on the island. With independence in 1965, the government had greater control over the master planning of Singapore’s development. Alongside an aggressive agenda for economic development and Top: Chinatown in 1970. Scenes such as this were common in the past. (Source: The Straits Times © Singapore Press Holdings Limited. Reprinted industrialisation, the government had the foresight to lay down policies ensuring that our with permission.) environment would not be compromised. This commitment to protect and safeguard our Opposite: Pagoda Street in 1972. (Source: The Straits Times © Singapore living surroundings is a cornerstone of Singapore’s transformation. Press Holdings Limited. Reprinted with permission.) Such a commitment is all the more crucial in the light of the challenges we face today. With rapid globalisation and technological advancements in industrial processes, the scale of environmental incidents is potentially further-reaching and more complex than before. Increasing industrialisation also means a growing amount of emissions from our industries. Within Singapore, the environment faces more stress as the population grows and land use becomes more intensive. SAFEGUARD NURTURE CHERISH 21 22 SAFEGUARD: A PLACE TO LIVE The task of bringing about clean air, clean water and clean land falls on NEA, which translates the policies and direction set by MEWR into action. NEA shapes the planning of Singapore’s land use, regulates the development of industries and makes sure that there is a balance between economic growth and environmental well-being. It stays on the alert and constantly monitors the quality of our air, water and land. It implements a stringent routine of licensing and enforcement to prevent environmental hazards from taking place. It also goes beyond its enforcer role to reach out to industries to educate, inform and encourage innovation. This will not be possible without the people in the agency, who work to safeguard and protect the environment. Much of what they do is not glamorous, and for some, it is tedious. Yet talk to any of the workers and they often speak of their work with pride. They are the people who bring industries in line with our strict requirements, who go to the ground to iron out issues. They are planners, inspectors, incineration plant operators, technicians, scientists and engineers, working in concert to keep our home clean and green. A home where we can breathe in clean air, enjoy clean beaches and work in liveable, sustainable surroundings. “The transition of the operations of environmental protection from the ministry to NEA in 2002 was smooth as the planning had been thorough and comprehensive. Nonetheless, there was a sense of autonomy from the ministry and with that came greater responsibility and accountability. We worked to ensure that Singaporeans could continue to enjoy clean air, clean water, clean land and a high standard of public health, and this was realised with the strong commitment, conviction and the camaraderie of the officers in NEA working to protect the environment.” — Loh Ah Tuan, Director-General, Environmental Protection Division, NEA (2002 - 2007) SAFEGUARD NURTURE CHERISH 23 24 SAFEGUARD: A PLACE TO LIVE Safeguarding Essentials Sound principles, a strong legal framework, thorough planning. Add to that a rigorous regime of surveillance, licensing and enforcement, constant innovation and the roping in of different stakeholders. Such is the formula employed by NEA to safeguard Singapore’s environment, to make sure that our air, water, and land are clean. THE PRINCIPLES OF IT ALL for potential sources of pollution and takes pre-emptive action where possible. An example is Singapore’s control of endosulfan, a Pollution that goes unchecked is one of the greatest ills of pesticide harmful to health, in 2008. Three years later, this pesticide industrialisation. was added to the list of persistent organic pollutants governed by Take, for example, the case of widespread mercury poisoning the Stockholm Convention, an international treaty to restrict organic during the 1950s in Minamata, Japan, after a chemical factory environmental pollutants. released industrial wastewater with high mercury content into the Armed with these three principles, everything else follows, from city’s waterways. Or the discovery in the 1950s and 1960s that the a legal framework to planning infrastructural developments. use of leaded petrol was linked to lead poisoning in humans and lower intelligence in children. There are many other similar cases. Singapore, being a relatively newcomer to industrialisation, has the advantage of learning from LAWS FOR A BETTER ENVIRONMENT such experiences in other countries. Which is how it formed three simple principles for environmental protection. Right up to the 1970s, laws and regulations in Singapore were still The first principle is to exercise “pollution control at source”. inadequate to protect the environment. For example, even though Literally, this means controlling pollution right where it happens it was illegal to discharge matter that could be a nuisance or danger before it escalates into bigger issues. Key sources of pollution – to health, no legal quantities were set. The provisions were also industrial facilities, power plants and vehicles – are regulated to ineffective since it was debatable what constituted a nuisance or make sure they do not pollute the environment. danger to health. Next, the “polluter pays principle” is an idea rooted in fairness. This began to change in the 1970s when several laws were Those who pollute are held accountable for managing the resultant introduced to improve public health and environmental protection. pollution. For example, industries that produce toxic waste are A key milestone was the Clean Air Act of 1972, which specified responsible for treating the waste before they can dispose it. industrial emission limits, among other regulations. These laws were The third principle, to “pre-empt pollution and take early action”, precise in their requirements and allowed better control over pollutive is derived from the fact that our understanding of the environmental activities. Together with the establishment of ENV in 1972, dramatic impact of technology is far outpaced by its advancement, as the improvement in Singapore’s environment was accomplished in a case of leaded petrol demonstrates. Thus, NEA watches closely matter of decades. SAFEGUARD NURTURE CHERISH 25 “The role of law in Singapore cannot be divorced from the administrative backbone to implement it. The fact that we don’t have corruption on a systemic level means that companies can’t just pollute and get away with it. Pollution control is partly technological. We have monitoring everywhere. In major factories, we literally can monitor what is coming out of the smokestack the moment it is happening. And I’m glad that we have moved beyond law as enforcement to co-enforcement. Now you can see a lot of major companies tracking their own pollutants. The environmental fact, the law as lived, is clearly strong.” — Professor Simon Tay, Chairman, NEA (2002 - 2008) A CASE FOR FLE X IBILI T Y Over time, Singapore’s environmental laws have undergone several rounds of revisions and consolidation to meet changing needs. Did you know that for trade effluent to be discharged into sewers, its Today, NEA administers a number of acts with their accompanying pH value must be between 6 to 9 and its temperature cannot exceed regulations, such as the comprehensive Environmental Protection 45°C? NEA also sets the limits of substances in trade effluent such and Management Act. as sulphates, chlorides and heavy metals. These are just some of the Under these laws, the private sector is also required to do its requirements listed in the Code of Practice on Pollution Control to ensure that trade effluent does not cause undue pollution in the part in controlling pollution. For instance, any development with waterways. The regulations are necessarily demanding to make sure the potential to cause serious pollution has to conduct a Pollution that our environment is not compromised by industrial activities.