Opening Address by Mr. Chee Hong Tat, Acting Minister for Transport, Senior Minister of State for Finance, at the MOT Family Scholarship Award Ceremony

Our Beacon Scholarship Recipients

Parents and Family Members

Ladies and Gentlemen

1.     Good evening. I would like to begin by congratulating our 36 undergraduate and 15 postgraduate recipients of our Beacon Scholarships, as well as your families. 

2.     The Beacon Scholarship was introduced in 2010 to attract talented Singaporeans with the desire to embark on an exciting career in the transport sector. The programme is now in its fourteenth year, and we have awarded scholarships covering areas such as engineering, economics and international relations.  

Building for the Future

3.     Our transport sectors have recovered strongly from the devastating impact of the pandemic. Weekly air passenger traffic has rebounded to about 90% of pre-COVID levels as of July 2023. Public transport ridership on weekdays also reached 93% of pre-COVID levels in June this year. Meanwhile, we have remained the world’s largest container transshipment hub. In 2022, we achieved our second highest container throughput of 37.3 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs). In the first half of this year, we handled more than 19 million TEUs, which is our highest first-half container throughput on record. 

4.     We are preparing ourselves for future growth. This includes major expansions in our aviation, maritime, and rail infrastructure to benefit not just this generation of Singaporeans, but also future generations of Singaporeans. These are long term projects.

a.     For Changi T5, we are working with consultants to incorporate lessons from the pandemic, and to update the design to be more modular, resilient and energy-efficient. Construction is expected to commence by 2025, and we expect the new terminal to be operational in the mid-2030s.  

b.     Tuas Port's development is on schedule. All of Phase 1 and two-thirds of Phase 2 reclamation works have been completed. When all four phases are fully operational in the 2040s, Tuas Port will cover the area of two Ang Mo Kios and have an annual handling capacity of 65 million TEUs.

c.     Our rail network will be expanded by a further 100km over the next decade, equivalent to the whole of the North-South Line and East-West Line combined.  

i.     As our MRT network grows, commuters will benefit from enhanced transport options. My residents in Toa Payoh West-Thomson have shared that they appreciate the convenience and connectivity brought about by the opening of the TEL Caldecott, Upper Thomson, and Bright Hill stations in August 2021. 

ii.    We have since opened Phase 3 of TEL last year, further improving the connectivity for commuters. Phase 4 will be launched next year, bringing even greater convenience to residents along our eastern coast. 

iii.   In addition, we are enhancing rail connectivity with Malaysia through the Rapid Transit System (RTS) Link between Singapore and Johor Bahru, which will be seamlessly connected to TEL at Woodlands North. The next major project milestone will be the commemoration by both Prime Ministers of the drop-in span, which joins both sides of the marine viaduct across the Straits of Johor.

iv.    All these efforts will bring the convenience many more Singaporeans, be it the airport or the rail network. These require MOT family, partners, our unions and workers to work closely together. By the mid-2030s, eight in ten homes will be within a ten-minute walk of an MRT station. 

Developing Capabilities

5.     To achieve this growth, we need individuals with the necessary skill sets. I’ll like to highlight three areas where we are building capabilities across the MOT family – one, engineering, which will continue to be a core competency; two, sustainability and three, digital technology, both which will enable us to meet nascent and future challenges.

Engineering

6.     We have a strong core of officers with deep engineering capabilities in the MOT family – they ensure our infrastructure is well planned and designed, and operated, managed and maintained properly. We will continue to attract and develop engineering talent.

a.     Among them will be Mr. Mohamed Izzat bin Mohamed Abdul Kadir, one of our sixteen mid-term scholars this year. Izzat will be pursuing his degree in Mechanical Engineering at NTU under an SGRail Industry Scholarship with SBS Transit.   

b.     Another example is Ms. Kyra Koh Qi Rui will pursue a Bachelor in Electrical Engineering at the University of California, Los Angeles. Public transport is an industry that has inspired Kyra for many years. Having observed rail power and maintenance fleet electrification at SBS Transit firsthand through the LTA Young Transport Engineer Programme, Kyra is looking forward to a career in LTA to improve the efficiency, reliability and sustainability of public transport. 

Sustainability

7. Let me now talk about sustainability and the green economy. Transport accounts for 15 per cent of our national carbon emissions. We have put forth strategies to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions to support our national 2050 net-zero target.  

a.     For land transport, we have made good progress in electrification. EVs account for over 14% of new car registrations in 2023 to date, up from about 12% in 2022 and about 4% in 2021. We have brought forward the island-wide deployment of EV chargers to address range anxiety, with 1 in 3 HDB carparks having EV charging points by the end of 2023. We launched a tender for about 400 electric public buses and they will start being on the roads from December 2024.

b.     We have also announced our ambition for all airside vehicles on the Changi Airport to run on cleaner energy by 2040.

c.     The domestic harbour craft sector will also achieve net-zero emissions by 2050. From 2030, all new harbour craft operating in our port waters must be fully electric, be capable of using B100 biofuels, or be compatible with net-zero fuels like hydrogen.

8.     The transformation and decarbonisation of our transport sector is an ambitious undertaking. So, we need the dedication and expertise of colleagues like Mr. Nicholas Ng. Nicholas is currently seconded from MOT to LTA and leads the Master Planning team at the National Electric Vehicle Centre. He also serves as the Director of Business Development and Chief Customer Experience of EVe, an LTA subsidiary set up to drive the development of a national charging network. Having helped develop our charger deployment masterplan to make every HDB town EV-ready by 2025, Nicholas will be pursuing a Master of Science in Technology Management at University College London.
 
9.     We also have Ms. Ujjayini Mukhopadhyay from MPA, who has a passion for sustainability. Ujjayini will be pursuing a Bachelor of Science in International Relations at the London School of Economics and Political Science. With her people-centric nature and curiosity to learn about our constantly changing global environment, she is well-placed to help Singapore bolster our standing in the international maritime economy arena.

Digital Technology

10.    Besides engineering and sustainability, we are also investing in transport-related technologies and systems, as well as cybersecurity, data analytics, and AI to maintain our competitive edge.

a.     LTA set up a Digital Lab last year to bring people, data, and digital tools in a single space. The aim is to harness technologies, such as Artificial Intelligence, Building Information Modelling, and Geographic Information Systems, to spur collaboration and innovation in the Land Transport Domain.

b.     MPA has upgraded the existing Maritime Security Operations Centre with more advanced capabilities to enhance early threat detection, monitoring and response to secure critical information infrastructure in MPA and our port operators.

c.     CAAS is investing in future air traffic management capabilities to make air travel safer, more efficient, and sustainable. Last month, CAAS successfully conducted the world’s first-ever multi-regional Trajectory-Based Operations demonstration flight with their Thailand, Japan and US partners. This is part of the work to transform and optimise the management of international flights across an aircraft’s entire flight trajectory, from take-off to touch-down.

11.    The work of our colleagues is critical to develop these innovative systems, and keep them operational and secure. This includes Mr. Mok Ji Wei, an LTA returning scholar. Prior to his studies in the University of Michigan, Ji Wei contributed to the preparation and implementation of the signalling system of the Thomson-East Coast Line. Currently, he is part of the MOT Technology Office, and is involved in technology master planning, capability development and digitalisation at the MOT family level. 

12.    In time to come, Ji Wei will be joined by the likes of Ms. Lao En Xing, who will be pursuing a Bachelor of Engineering in Electronic and Information Engineering at Imperial College, London. En Xing is excited about the aviation’s industry’s fast-paced and dynamic nature, and is keen to advance new technologies, such as unmanned autonomous vehicles, at CAAS. She is also looking forward to applying engineering techniques in complex operations, such as digitalising airport operations and optimising air traffic control.

Closing

13.    Before concluding my speech, I would like to welcome our undergraduate scholars to the MOT family, and to thank our post-graduate scholars for your service and contributions.  

14.    To all our scholars, the scholarship provides opportunities for you to deepen your knowledge, broaden your horizons and expand your networks. We look forward to your contributions to MOT’s important purpose and mission upon your return. I wish you every success in your studies and your careers.  

15.    Thank you.