PERMANENT RESIDENTS

PERMANENT RESIDENTS

**

(Figures): **

2.

Mr Siew Kum Hong asked the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Home Affairs, for each of the last 10 years (a) how many persons were granted permanent residency in Singapore; (b) what were the 20 most common nationalities of such persons granted permanent residency; and (c) how many Singapore Permanent Residents became Singapore citizens.

Mr Wong Kan Seng: Over the last 10 years, ie, from 1997 to 2006, an average of about 36,000 persons were granted permanent residence (PR) in Singapore annually. They came predominantly from South-East, South and East Asia and some were from diverse places, such as the Americas, Oceania and Europe (see Table 1 below).

** Table 1: Average number of PR granted annually for 1997-2006 **

Nationality

|

Average number of PR granted annually for 1997-2006

|

Percentage

---|---|---

South East Asian Countries

|

17,522

|

48.4%

Other Asian countries

|

16,183

|

44.7%

Others

|

2,487

|

6.9%

Total

|

36,192

|

100%

Column: 847

The total PR granted has generally been on an upward trend. Since 2001, the number of PR granted was consistently more than 30,000. For the years 2005 and 2006, the number of PR granted was above 50,000.

Over the last 10 years, an average of about 8,500 Singapore Permanent Residents became Singapore Citizens annually.

Column: 847