Rental Costs as a Percentage of Total Business Costs for SMEs

Mr Gerald Giam Yean Song asked the Minister for Trade and Industry what is the percentage of rental costs out of total business costs for SMEs with (i) 10 or more employees and (ii) fewer than 10 employees, for the years 2012, 2013 and 2014, broken down by industry sector.

Mr Lim Hng Kiang: SPRING Singapore defines small and medium enterprises (SMEs) as enterprises with operating receipts of not more than S$100 million or employment size of not more than 200 workers.

Based on this definition, rental costs accounted for less than 5% of the total business costs of SMEs in the manufacturing sector in both 2012 and 2013 as shown in Table 1 below.

As for the SMEs in the services industries, the share of rental costs in their business costs in 2012 and 2013 varied significantly by industry (Table 2). For example, while rentals were a key cost component for SMEs in the retail trade and accommodation & food services industries, they accounted for only a small proportion of SMEs’ total business costs in the other services industries.

A breakdown into the rental cost shares for SMEs with fewer than 10 employees, and 10 or more employees is not available for all industries. As for the rental cost statistics for 2014, they will be ready at a later date.