Singapore Deputy Prime Minister Gan Kim Yong was held at a panel meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland on Tuesday, January 21, 2025. January 20-24.
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The country’s deputy prime minister said Singapore may only see the “limited” direct impact of U.S. tariffs as the country faces a trade deficit with the United States.
In 2024, The United States has a trade surplus Singapore has $2.8 billion.
However, Singapore’s Deputy Prime Minister and Trade and Industry Minister Gan Kim Yong said that in the long run, city states “can’t underestimate” the impact of tariffs.
In an exclusive interview with CNBCAsquawk Box Asia“Gan stressed that companies can decide to change their production base. In turn, supply chains and trade patterns will change, causing “greater friction and higher costs” in the global economy, which may slow down.
Asked if tariffs would affect Singapore’s growth forecast, Gan said Singapore would not take its economic forecast for granted and constantly strive to meet or even exceed its target.
“We are trying to push the economy further and hope we can perform better than expected,” Gan said, adding that the country will also “be prepared to give economic disruptions, ready to give some space.”
Singapore’s economy depends largely on trade, and the country has Transaction to GDP ratio exceeds 300%one of the highest in the world.
Gan’s comments were made public by Singapore’s Prime Minister Lawrence Huang. National budget for fiscal year 2025. It provides families and businesses with a range of support measures to cope with the pressure of cost of living and plans to support local companies’ development.
A famous announcement made by Wong in his budget speech is that Singapore will study The country’s potential deployment of nuclear powerAfter initially assessing that conventional nuclear energy was not suitable for city-states in 2010.
Gan told CNBC that the main considerations in Singapore are the safety and maturity of nuclear technology, and also noted that Singapore’s small land size prevents it from having larger safety buffers, such as traditional nuclear power plants.
island 456.3 square miles Relying mainly on liquefied natural gas to promote its energy demand. In 2023, About 95% of energy production comes from liquefied natural gas. Most of Singapore’s natural gas comes from Malaysia and Indonesia.
The remaining 5% of the electricity supply is generated by a mixture of coal, oil, solar energy and waste.
Therefore, Singapore is observing the development of small modular reactors or SMRs to assess whether they are suitable for the country.
“For example, it’s all about the development of technology, how do we commercialize SMRs to ensure they are feasible and suitable for us?” Gan said.
Although he did not specify how long it would take to implement nuclear energy in Singapore, if any, “if there is, we will need some time to prepare for SMR when the technology is available,” he said. “Even preparing for a site takes time.”
