Context:

Recently, Singapore hosted the second round of India-Singapore Ministerial Roundtable (ISMR).

Key Highlights of ISMR:

• The main objective of the second ISMR is to review the progress in bilateral collaboration since the first ISMR.
• The ministers assessed the progress of India – Singapore Strategic Partnership, particularly under the pillars of Digitalization, Skills Development, Sustainability, Healthcare & Medicine, identified during the 1st meeting of ISMR (held in New Delhi, September 2022).

A significant outcome of this roundtable was the decision to expand the partnership by adding two new pillars: 

• Advanced Manufacturing
• Connectivity
• The Ministers agreed to hold the next round of ISMR in India at a mutually convenient time.

India-Singapore Bilateral relations

• Singapore has emerged as a vital source of foreign direct investment (FDI) for India and it is India’s largest trade partner in ASEAN.

Five areas of cooperation (5S) were agreed in 2014 for specific focus – 

• Scale up Trade & Investment
• Speed up Connectivity 
• Smart Cities & Urban Rejuvenation 
• Skill development 
• State focus

Singapore is India’s 6th largest trade partner with a share of 2.9% of India’s overall trade (2021-22).

• Singapore is India’s largest trade partner in ASEAN.
• The cumulative FDI inflows from Singapore to India stood at USD 136.65 billion (April 2000 – June 2022) which is 23 percent of total FDI inflows in India.
• ISRO launched Singapore’s first indigenously built micro-satellite in 2011; 2 more in 2014 and 6 in 2015.
• Ethnic Indians constitute about 9.1 % or around 3.5 lakhs of the resident population of 3.9 million in Singapore.