MINISTRY OF COMMUNICATIONS

Civil aviation

Growth rates of air traffic through Singapore have exceeded average international growth levels expected at 15 per cent a year. In the past two years, passenger traffic at Paya Lebar Airport has been growing at an average annual rate of 21 per cent. Growth of air cargo is more rapid with average annual increase of 42 per cent. Passenger traffic is expected to grow from 1.57 million passengers in 1970 to 3.64 million passengers in 1975, to 15.6 million passengers in 1985 - a ten-fold increase. Air cargo will rise faster; from 25,600 metric tons in 1970 to 94,900 metric tons in 1975, to 1.309,000 metric tons in 1985-a fifty-fold increase.

To meet this extremely rapid rate of growth and the operational requirements of wide-bodied aircraft such as the Boeing-747, as well as the supersonic's, a second runway has to be built by 1980, if not earlier. Land is already earmarked for the second runway at Paya Lebar. But as Changi would be handed back to Singapore at the end of the year, the Ministry of Communications is studying the feasibility of building the second runway at Changi, which can then be developed as Singapore's second international airport.

Besides first-class hotels by international standards, and scenic recreational centres such as S-ento-sa, the growth of tourism in Singapore will depend in rapid begin by the Pro-large measure on easy air connections and inexpensive fares. The Government will, therefore, enter into more bilateral air services agreements to enable not only the scheduled airlines of other countries, but also their non-scheduled carriers to o-perate regular and full-load charter services to and beyond Singapore. The Singapore national airline and Saber Air will in turn exploit the opportunities which bilateral air services agreements will open to them. Singapore's national air-line is considering the pu-rc-h-ase of the wide-bodied jet aircraft for operations in the near future. Encouragement will be given to leading international aircraft manufacturing companies to set up aerospace industries at Seletar and Changi, to which added racilities are being considered. The establishnient of an Air Academy to train flight crew and technicians on a proper co-ordinated basis, probably at Seletar, is under consideration to help the matipower requirements of Singapore's airlines and the aerospace industries.

Public transportation

The major overhaul of the public bus transportation system was successfully completed after some initial teething difficulties. 542 new buses were added, making a total of 1,816 public buses. Ten Chinese bus companies were amalgamated into three larger ones. Direct services now link the rural areas, the suburbs, the satellite towns, to Jurong, and to the City.

School buses increased by 900 after reorganisation. This rapid build-up of public buses has made the eradication of illegal pirate taxi operations possible -- a traffic hazard which has plagued Singapore for the last 15 years.

In the 1980's, Singapore's public bus tiansport will have to be complemented by a mass rapid transit system. A rigorous evaluation of the financial and technical feasibility of a mass transit system for Singapore will early next year. It will be assisted United Nations Development gramme and the World Bank.

Telecommunications

Singapore's communication satellite earth station at Sentosa will become operational in August this year. The earth station will link up with the Indian Ocean intelsat III Satellite, enabling Singapore to communicate directly with countries as far east as Japan, and as far west as Britain. The Telecommunications Department is planning to build another antenna to face the Pacific Ocean. The two satellite earth station antennae will put Singapore into direct space communication with more than two-thirds of the world. They will complement Singapore's communication links by land and sea.

The first 600 lines of the 1,200-line National Automatic Telex Exchange will be commissioned in September this year. The International Telex Service will become fully automatic by 1973, initially with 150 lines. When ready, telex calls need not go through operators.

To cater for the off-shore oil explorers, a high frequency radio network will soon be installed.

An approach control radar system for Singapore International Airport of 70-80 miles' range will be comissioned next year.

With all these developments, organisational changes have become necessary. The Telecommunications Department will be converted into a statutory authority in April 1972. This will allow more speedy response to the rapidly changing and highly complex space age communication systems.

Telephones

The telephone network in Singapore has to grow by 16 per cent per annum in the next five years to cope with demand. The five-year development programme, 1971-1975, will cost $212 million. Only a part of this can be financed from operational surpluses averaging $12 million a year on existing rentals. Not all of the balance of about $160 million can be borrowed.

The World Bank has given a loan of $33 million to the Singapore Telephone Board (S.T.B.) to finance its current capital development programme. To finance this vast expansion programme, it will be necessary for the S.T.B, to raise its rentals. The expansion programme, when completed, will provide 15 telephones per 100 population by 1975, compared with 7.7 per 100 population in 1970.

Postal services

The Ministry's most traditional department, the Postal Services Department, is in the midst of a re-organisation exercise. The National Productivity Centre is helping. The number of postal articles handled has been growing by 10 per cent a year. It is expected to rise even more sharply.

The General Post Office would be decentralised into several regional or district general post offices, for speedier processing and delivery. The facing, cancelling and sorting of letters will be mechanised as much as possible. More deliveries will be made by postmen on motorcycles and scooters, instead of on bicycles or on foot.

Legislation was introduced on 1st March 1971 requiring all high-rise residential and commercial buildings, including Government buildings, with more than four storeys to provide letterboxes at a central point on the ground or first floor for the delivery of letters and other mail to their tenants. Owners, or developers of existing high-rise buildings will be allowed up to 1st March, i973 to provide such letter-boxes on their premises. This is a necessary adjustment in a city rapidly urbanised and growing literally upwards.

Traditionally, the Post Office Savings Bank business is handled at Post Offices with other postal and non-postal transactions. In order to provide more retail outlets for the convenience of depositors, the Bank will be setting up separate branches, which are fully air-conditioned providing solely Savings Bank business in various parts of Singapore. The Bank's first air-conditioned branch was set up at the General Post Office in Fullerton Building recently. The Bank will be reconstituted as an autonomous statutory corporation by 1st January 1972. This will give the Bank greater flexibility to provide better and more efficient services to its depositors.

Port and shipping

Shipping and cargo tonnages in 1960 were 68.9 million net registered tons and 14.9 million freight tons respectively. In 1970 they had grown to 148.7 million net registered tons and 42.2 million freight tons, increases of 115.82 per cent and 183.22 per cent respectively. New policies were adopted in 1970 to ensure the continued use of Singapore as a trading and transhipment centre and to cater for the revolutionary changes in sea-borne transportation. Current major development projects such as the container port project, the provision of more warehousing and berthing facilities, were re-examined. Several changes had to be made. For example, the coming of third generation container vessels has necessitated several changes to the existing container berth design. Plans to develop an inland container depot were mapped out. The Port of Singapore Authority began acquiring land for the purpose. At Jardine Steps an ocean terminal to accommodate facilities such as ferry services, as well as a cable car to link Sentosa, is being developed.

Cargo handling was streamlined to enable a faster turn-round. A reorganised labour force, and 24-hour service, plus better use of equipment, improved efficiency, and increased earnings of workers.

Seamen training facilities are to be expanded to provide for better quality training. Multi-purpose training of crew is now necessary to man the more modern ships and give them higher pay. Present seamen will be given special retraining to upgrade their skills and pay.

A National Maritime Board is being formed to co-ordinate, promote and develop maritime employment, training and welfare. The proposed Maritime' Board will replace the four existing marine statutory bodies.

As at 30-6-71, there were 521 ships totalling 742,894 gross tons flying the Singapore Flag. This compares with 377 ships totalling 319,675 gross tons as on 30-6-69, an increase of 38.19 per cent and 132.39 per cent respectively. The Singapore Registry offers various incentives, including exemption from income tax.

Pollution

Environmental pollution is being checked. During the year ended 31-3-71, a total of 32,680 vehicles were booked for excessive emission of exhaust smoke. The campaign will continue. On the sea, stringent measures were adopted by the Port of Singapore Authority (P.S.A.) to control pollution of our waters. New harbour safety measures combined with better surveillance were introduced. The P.S.A, will be setting up oil disposal facilities where ships may discharge slop. As the Airport expands and the number of planes using it increases, noise pollution becomes more of a problem. It is not possible to completely eliminate noise. But measures are being taken to minimise the noise pollution. The Singapore International Airport runway is being extended northwards instead of southwards so that noise nuisance can be reduced. The possibility of re-routing the landing and take-off paths is being studied to lower the noise problem for the more populated areas of the city.

Meteorology

A 10 cm, weather radar costing $500,000 was installed at the Airport Operations Building of Paya Lebar Airport to replace an older equipment. This high performance radar will enable the location and tracking of storms and thunderclouds within a radius of 250 miles. It also allows the study of the vertical structure of individual storms. This radar is indispensable for short-term weather forecasting and for quantitative rainfall measurements, particularly during the Northeast monsoon season.

An automatic picture read-out station to obtain cloud photographs from weather satellites was set up at the Airport in December 1970. These photographs, transmitted by orbiting satellites, give an accurate pictorial description of weather and details of cloud distribution and patterns over Asia and South-West Pacific. Satellite data is a new meteorological aid. It supplements conventional weather analysis. It has also proved to be invaluable for long-range forecasting.