Environmental issues in Singapore include air, water pollution, and deforestation. The government established the Singapore Green Plan in 1992 to help with environmental issues.
Since the founding of Singapore in 1819, more than 95% of its estimated 590 square km of vegetation has been cleared. At first for short-term cash crops and later because of urbanization and industrialization. 61 of its original 91 bird species has been lost leading to many native forest plants not being able to reproduce because of loss of seed dispersal and pollination. [1]
Since 1980, development and increased pressure for land usage has led to Singapore losing 90% of its forests, 67% of its birds, 40% of its mammals and 5% of its amphibians and reptiles. [2]
Singapore had a 2018 Forest Landscape Integrity Index mean score of 1.11/10, ranking it 165th globally out of 172 countries. [3]
As a result of the nation’s ambitious land reclamation, environmental impacts extend beyond its shores too. Singapore’s shores have expanded by 22% since its independence and Singapore has become one of the largest importers of sand in the world, importing 517 million tonnes in the last 20 years alone. Most of this sand was sourced from Indonesia and Malaysia until both countries imposed a ban due to the environmental impact – Indonesia saw 24 islands disappear. Sand dredging in Cambodia has also threatened its coastal environments, endangered species and destroying the livelihoods of fishing villages. [2]
In 1984, there were health concerns with the great number of pig farms in Singapore. They were deemed to have contributed to the pollution of the country, namely to the air. This problem was solved by reducing the number of such farms. [4] 65.8 metric tons (64.8 long tons; 72.5 short tons) of carbon dioxide were emitted in the country in 1996, ranking among the highest emission levels in the world. Air polluters in Singapore are mostly, but not only, vehicles for transport, despite the country's tough regulations. [5] The country had been blanketed in haze for a period of time, which was contributed by smoke from Indonesian fires. [6]
Singapore is a country with limited water resources, and it is essential for its water quality to be carefully regulated. Water in Singapore is polluted by unwanted materials contributed by industrial facilities, coupled by oil from both incoming and outgoing trading vessels. [7] Corrective measures are taken, and affected water is taken for treatment at specialised centres. [5] Plants such as NEWater treat unwanted water into drinkable water. [8] One major water body in Singapore which used to be polluted is the Singapore River. [9] [10]
To combat the country's environmental problems, the Singaporean government first made the Singapore Green Plan in 1992 and a new edition of it in 2012 to continue it. The plan has since been superseded by the Singapore Green Plan 2030 in 2021. [11] [12] The plan aims to keep tabs on the unstable populations of fauna and flora, to place new nature parks and to connect existing parks. [13] It was announced on 3 June 2013 that the government will begin recording the amount of carbon emitted in the country and how much of it is absorbed by the country's flora. [14] Though some scholars have called Singapore an "environmental oasis," [15] others have accused it of "greenwashing," citing the nation's attention to aesthetic greenery and high carbon footprint. [16]
Education is increasingly seen as playing a key role in shaping environmental attitudes. Currently, Singapore has no policy documents to spell out what environmental topics should be taught in public schools, or how environmental education should be included within the curriculum. [17] Some have argued that while Singapore's educational system trains students to perform well on standardized tests, it fails to teach young people environmental values. [18] This is supported by an analysis of the environmental values portrayed in Singapore's secondary school history textbooks, which found that these textbooks "represent narrowly utilitarian, negativistic, and dominionistic perspectives of thinking about and relating to the nonhuman environment. In contrast, aesthetic, humanistic, moralistic, and ecologistic-scientific interactions with the nonhuman environment are either entirely absent or infrequently portrayed in textbook narratives." [19]
Singapore's rapid development into an urban nation has neglected the natural environment, according to a report published by the National University of Singapore, which ranked the country as the "worst environmental offender among 179 countries". The government called the ranking unfair, claiming that Singapore is unique due to its "limited land size" and consequent "high intensity of land use". [20]
Environmental laws are laws that protect the environment. Environmental law is the collection of laws, regulations, agreements and common law that governs how humans interact with their environment. This includes environmental regulations; laws governing management of natural resources, such as forests, minerals, or fisheries; and related topics such as environmental impact assessments. Environmental law is seen as the body of laws concerned with the protection of living things from the harm that human activity may immediately or eventually cause to them or their species, either directly or to the media and the habits on which they depend.
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Human impact on the environment refers to changes to biophysical environments and to ecosystems, biodiversity, and natural resources caused directly or indirectly by humans. Modifying the environment to fit the needs of society is causing severe effects including global warming, environmental degradation, mass extinction and biodiversity loss, ecological crisis, and ecological collapse. Some human activities that cause damage to the environment on a global scale include population growth, neoliberal economic policies and rapid economic growth, overconsumption, overexploitation, pollution, and deforestation. Some of the problems, including global warming and biodiversity loss, have been proposed as representing catastrophic risks to the survival of the human species.
The Singapore Green Plan (SGP) was created in 1992 to ensure that the economic growth model of Singapore does not compromise the environment. The SGP sets out the strategies, programs and targets for Singapore to maintain a quality living environment while pursuing economic prosperity. The focus areas in the SGP are led by a main coordinating committee and respective action program committees. Since 1992, the SGP has been continuously updated to ensure its relevance, releasing SGP 2012 in 2002 and SGP 2030 in 2021. The United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) are correlated or mapped to the SGP.
Water supply and sanitation in Singapore are intricately linked to the historical development of Singapore. It is characterised by a number of outstanding achievements in a challenging environment with geographical limitations. Access to water in Singapore is universal, affordable, efficient and of high quality.
The environmental humanities is an interdisciplinary area of research, drawing on the many environmental sub-disciplines that have emerged in the humanities over the past several decades, in particular environmental literature, environmental philosophy, environmental history, science and technology studies, environmental anthropology, and environmental communication. Environmental humanities employs humanistic questions about meaning, culture, values, ethics, and responsibilities to address pressing environmental problems. The environmental humanities aim to help bridge traditional divides between the sciences and the humanities, as well as between Western, Eastern, and Indigenous ways of relating to the natural world and the place of humans within it. The field also resists the traditional divide between "nature" and "culture," showing how many "environmental" issues have always been entangled in human questions of justice, labor, and politics. Environmental humanities is also a way of synthesizing methods from different fields to create new ways of thinking through environmental problems.
An urban forest is a forest, or a collection of trees, that grow within a city, town or a suburb. In a wider sense, it may include any kind of woody plant vegetation growing in and around human settlements. As opposed to a forest park, whose ecosystems are also inherited from wilderness leftovers, urban forests often lack amenities like public bathrooms, paved paths, or sometimes clear borders which are distinct features of parks. Care and management of urban forests is called urban forestry. Urban forests can be privately and publicly owned. Some municipal forests may be located outside of the town or city to which they belong.
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Environmental policy in China is set by the National People's Congress and managed by the Ministry of Environmental Protection of the People's Republic of China. Under the Ministry of Environmental Protection of the People's Republic of China, the Department of Policies, Laws, and Regulations is in charge of establishing and strengthening basic laws and policies such as environmental laws, administrative policies and economical regulations. It is also responsible for the development of national environmental protection policy and macro strategy.
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