MINISTRY OF CULTURE

The Ministry of Culture encourages a more cultivated and well-informed society. It bears in mind that what is acceptable or even fashionable abroad is not necessarily good for Singapore.

Cultural Promotion

We give organisational and financial support to the arts. We provide advanced training for talented individuals, promote literary journals and translations of significant literary works, organise workshops and master classes in the performing arts, and hold festivals and exhibitions.

Information Service

Ministries and key departments will soon have full-time Public Relations Officers. The Information Division will co-ordinate the work of Public Relations Officers and improve the quality of its publications and press liaison work.

Courtesy and Mandarin Campaigns

The Courtesy and Mandarin Campaigns have made progress. They will continue.

Radio and Television

The Singapore Broadcasting Corporation (SBC) was set up on 1st February 1980. The organisation of the station has been restructured and strengthened. Radio and TV services will be improved in quality.

Better qualified newscasters have been recruited both locally and from overseas. The news presentation has improved. A fortnightly current affairs programme will be launched on TV in March this year. There will be more locally-produced educational programmes, dramas, musical shows and sports coverages on TV. SBC will also improve on its capacity to dub dialect programmes into Mandarin.

SBC's Radio Service will provide for greater community participation. As a start, in 1981 there will be a radio series involving Residents' Committees. Existing FM transmitters and aerial system will be replaced this year. It will improve reception for both home and car radio listeners.

SBC will set up a Training School. The School will conduct courses and workshops for the staff as well as members of the public who have an interest in, and the talent for, acting, singing, dancing, compering and other related fields.

National Museum

The National Museum will add new galleries and exhibits relating to the history of Singapore. Multi-media presentations, advanced museum display techniques and audio-visual aids will be introduced.

Library Service

It is the aim to provide full-time branch libraries to all major new towns by the end of this decade. A full-time branch library in Bukit Merah and a new part-time branch library at Whampoa are planned in FY 81.

Computerisation of library cataloguing operations is expected to be completed during FY 81. Computerisation of other library operations like acquisitions, loans, and information retrieval will be implemented in the next three years. The National Library also intends to expand its audio-visual services.

National Archives and Records

The National Archives and Records Centre plans to organise more exhibitions to make known to the public collections of historically significant documents, photographs, maps and other archival materials. It will also promote the wider use of microfilming techniques in the Civil Service to improve information storage and retrieval. Oral History

An Oral History Programme, capturing people's memories of important past events on tape recordings, is underway. The Unit has started two recording projects, namely Political Development of Singapore 1945-65 and The Pioneers of Singapore.

S. DHANABALAN Minister for Culture