Ms He Ting Ru: Sir, the enhancement of the Enterprise Financing Scheme and the Energy Efficiency Grant is welcome. Incentives and grants are critical in providing seed support and are crucial in driving SME growth and are important signals in the industrial strategy we are developing, especially for our green transition. Yet, a DBS survey found that 63% of SMEs in Asia identified as their top challenge transitioning to a sustainable business model.
In a survey reported in the Singapore Business Review last month, 58% of small and microbusinesses polled are less confident about prospects in 2024. The survey also said that apart from grants, SMEs feel they need more support in areas ranging from subsidies for talent and acquisition schemes, indicative of the tight labour market, more support for international expansion and rental assistance and rental support.
The same survey also found that a streamlined grant application process was on the wishlist. We should continue to simplify the adoption process for grants and in particular, green grants.
For many SMEs, daily operations are a priority and not grant applications and associated administrative work. Perhaps, one way to improve the system would be for Enterprise Singapore to provide a one-stop web page offering advice and guidance to SMEs on how they can green their business and what the associated grants are. Also important, are the money itself and the time value of money. Could the Government provide some of these grants on a cash rather than a reimbursement basis, to help firms who would not normally look at environmental matters in their cashflow planning?
Additionally, in order to properly understand whether our grants are properly supporting our SMEs, we should publicly announce how we track their success. For example, alongside how much has been disbursed for green grants, we should state how many tonnes of emissions have been mitigated per dollar spent, so that the public, civil society and Members of Parliament can be sure that these taxpayer-paid subsidies are working; and to measure how they have achieved their goals. Other commentators have noted that the lack of standardised measurement in reporting standards have made the ESG compliance efforts challenging for SMEs.
Finally, a conversation article reproduced in the Business Times last year also stated that workers and managers in SMEs often have less resources and know-how to understand and properly tackle mental health challenges, partly because most research about mental health and well-being at work is usually undertaken in larger organisations. I hope that we would study how to tackle mental health and well-being at work in the context of our smaller enterprises – in order to understand the particular challenges that they face and to ultimately develop interventions that are targeted to work to raise the well-being of our workers in SMEs; and see if any interventions can be made beyond those which currently form part of MOM’s Total Workplace Safety and Health programme.
The Minister of State for Trade and Industry (Ms Low Yen Ling): Chairman, the green transition presents both opportunities and challenges to enterprises. I want to assure Ms He Ting Ru and Mr Neil Parekh that the Government will continue to deepen and widen our support for businesses through the different stages of their sustainability journey.
First, we are enhancing our existing support to help businesses to become more sustainable through the Energy Efficiency Grant (EEG). In 2022, we launched the EEG to help our enterprises defray rising energy costs. Since then, Mr Edward Chia and Mr Mark Lee would be glad to know that almost 2,000 companies have used EEG. For example, CF F&B, a drink stall in a food court. I want to give Members examples like that so that you know that EEG is not just used by bigger SMEs but can be used by heartland merchants or even a food stall in a food court. So, CF F&B is a drink stall in a food court. They used the grant to procure three energy-efficient water heaters that led to cost savings of about 80%, 80% cost savings. We will help more businesses invest in energy-efficient equipment. From 1 April, local food services, retail and manufacturing companies can continue to receive enhanced support of up to 70%.
EEG will be open to other industries, such as maritime, construction and data centres by the end of this year. MTI is working closely with the industry to onboard additional sectors as necessary. We will also streamline the application process by consolidating all the EEG applications from different sectors on the Business Grants Portal.
EEG complements existing schemes like the Enterprise Sustainability Programme (ESP) to provide holistic end-to-end support. For example, companies can tap into ESP for consultancy support to pinpoint areas for efficiency gains before applying to buy the energy-efficient equipment under EEG.
Secondly, we will enhance the existing Resource Efficiency Grant for Emissions (REGE) by lowering the qualifying carbon abatement threshold from 500 tonnes to 250 tonnes per annum. This will enable more businesses to tap into the grant for their projects.
Finally, we will extend the Enterprise Financing Scheme (Green) or EFS (Green) till 31 March 2026 and expand its scope to cover companies adopting green solutions. As Mr Edward Chia pointed out, data centres and chip manufacturers would do well to use schemes like the EFS (Green) to reduce their emissions.
The Chairman: Our current guillotine time is 4.15 pm, but it included a 20-minute break. I still see many hands. So, if Members do not mind, we will have a very, very short break. I will allow clarifications, if Members do not mind, but it will eat into our break time. Ms He Ting Ru.
Ms He Ting Ru: Thank you, Mr Chairman. I have a couple of clarifications for Minister Gan. I think I heard Minister Gan mention earlier about precision medicine. So, I just wanted to ask for a bit more details about the Ministry’s assessment of what sort of potential that precision medicine can have as a growth area in relation to the Singapore economy.
The second point relates to whether MTI is currently working with agencies like the Ministry of Health (MOH) and the Health Promotion Board (HPB) in relation to addressing some of the concerns around precision medicine, because at the moment, it is quite prohibitively expensive. I am just concerned about accessibility to those who might not have a high income. So, whether they can share details about the work that is being done with MOH or HPB in relation to addressing some of these concerns.
Mr Gan Kim Yong: Thank you. I have given a broad perspective of the potential for the precision medicine market in my speech. I think you can refer to that in terms of the numbers. But in terms of the specific areas of potential, this is a very early stage of an emerging technology. As some Members have said, if we do not move in time, we will never have time to move.
So, I think it is something for which we have to grab the opportunity to work with companies who are in this field to develop new technologies. The potential is to find new solutions and new therapies by working on genomics and see how the genes interact with one another; and also coupled with the advent of AI that has made precision medicine even more promising. So, this is an area that we are well positioned to collaborate with leaders in the world to develop this particular sector.
On the second question, yes, indeed, we are in discussion with MOH. Because at some point in time, when companies want to conduct clinical trials, they will also have to work with MOH to ensure that they have access to patients for some of these clinical trials. When the therapies are available, I think we will then have to discuss with MOH how to ensure that their funding is adequate and the appropriate therapies are available to Singaporeans. There will always be clinical guidelines or some indications for this therapy, and I think this is something that is a work in progress. We will continue to work with MOH with regard to clinical therapy as well as funding requirements.
Ministry of Trade and Industry
1 March 2024
https://sprs.parl.gov.sg/search/#/sprs3topic?reportid=budget-2361
Office of the Leader of the Opposition 