Singapore has changed significantly over its forty-three years of independence. The tables below track the key economic and social indicators and provide a snapshot of Singapore's journey. From a port with a small population of about 1.9 million and GDP1 per capita of S$4,668 (US$1,525) in 1965, Singapore has developed into a dense city state with more than 4 million people and GDP per capita of S$44,767 (US$26,897) in 2005 (Table AI.1).

In tandem with economic and population growth, Singapore has also progressed in social and human development aspects such as health and education levels of its citizens (Table AI.1). Adult literacy rates have increased from about 70 per cent in the 1970s to 95 per cent today. The quality and standards of healthcare services have also improved, as shown by the reduction of infant mortality rates from 26.3 to only 2 per 1,000 live-births in 2005. Total life expectancy at birth for residents has increased from 64.5 to 79.7 years since 1965.

International Benchmarking:

(a) Global Competitiveness Index

The Global Competitiveness Report series produced by the World Economic Forum is widely regarded as the world's most comprehensive assessment of countries’ competitiveness, providing a dataset on a broad array of competitiveness indicators for a large number of industrialized and developing economies. The World Economic Forum (WEF) ranked Singapore the 7th most competitive economy out of 131 countries under its Global Competitiveness Index (Table AI.2).

(b) Human Development Index (HDI)

The HDI, published every year by the Human Development Report since 1990, provides a broadened prism for viewing human development and well-being beyond economic growth. It provides a composite measure of three dimensions of human development: living a long and healthy life, being educated and with a decent standard of living. The HDI for Singapore in 2005 is 0.922, which translates to a rank of 25th out of 177 countries with data (Table AI.3).

(c) Mercer Quality of Living

Mercer's Worldwide Quality of Living is an annual survey that measures livability of cities for expatriates based on factors that people consider representative of quality of living.