Essay Draft 1b

Since globalization began, everywhere is highly accessible through means like ships, planes and cars. Migration became less of  an unusual practice, many moved for better living conditions while others move for better job opportunities, moving away from rural areas to urbanized regions or to earn more for their families back in their hometown. In the article "Linking Population, Poverty and Development"(n.d), it is recorded that in 2010, some 214 million people lived outside their country of origin. With the rising numbers in migration, there is high tendency for overcrowding to occur, especially in urbanized areas. Some countries includes Singapore,which exemplify the overcrowding issue. Many citizens have been rallying to voice their views on the overcrowding issue and part of the reason was that it affected the transportation heavily. As mentioned by Reuters (2013), some citizens were displeased with the rising number of foreigners which caused transportation problem and resulted in rallying a protest to seek improvement.

Despite the scarcity in land space, Singapore has 7301 population/km^2 and ranked 1st as the most densely populated country according to statistics shown in "Population Density"(n.d). As such, Singapore faces problem such as housing and transport. Commuters travelling in the morning will experience the much hated queue to get on the train or having to stand on a bumpy bus ride for an hour or so. It is a critical issue that the government has been trying to address. Also, one of Singapore's largest opposition party, Singapore Democratic Party (SDP), emphasized in "Building A People" (n.d) on the negative impacts that overpopulation in Singapore have caused and highlighted that transportation is one the key issue that needs to be addressed.

It would be considered absurd and will affect Singapore's international image and portray hostility towards foreigners to chase foreigners away from Singapore to control the population. Although it is critical for the government to control the population to prevent the aggravation of overcrowding problem, the Singapore government is putting in place policies to limit the employment of foreigners to locals ratio. As described in "Calculation of Foreign Worker Quotas" (2013), the total foreign employees that can be employed is based on the Dependency Ratio Ceiling (DRC) of the various sector. Employers can algorithm to find the maximum number of foreign employees that he/she can employ. Levies are also applied on the employment of foreign workers to regulate the number of foreign workers in Singapore, as mentioned in "Levies & quotas for hiring foreign workers" (2013). Such implementation sums up the efforts that the government are putting to minimize the imbalance of foreign and local employees.

The Singapore government fortunately, took notice of the situation and has been trying to salvage the situation by several implementations. Such as the expansion of train service lines, more and more train and bus routes are provided. In "Circle Line"(n.d), circle is built to shorten trips between east, west and north. Another initiative  that have been introduced since June 2013, stated in "Travel smart" (2013), by encouraging commuters to travel early and avoid peak period in the morning, it gives commuters incentive by making the travel free if commuters were to exit from the 16 specific city areas before 7.45am.

Despite efforts in improving the situation, many are still dissatisfied. Improvements are visible but commuters still face huge crowds everyday during peak periods and may worsen with Cheam (2013) reporting that Singapore's population is expected to grow further. The population is projected to increase to 6.9million by 2030, which may mean that the strain on transportation will be adversely affected and with that, Singapore ought to seek for more solutions to address transportation issue caused by overcrowding before more Singaporeans are displease.

Reference list:

1. Calculation of Foreign Worker Quotas (9 October 2013) retrieved on 10 October 2013, from http://www.mom.gov.sg/foreign-manpower/foreign-worker-levies/Pages/calculation-of-foreign-worker-quotas.aspx
2. Circle Line (n.d) retrieved on 9 October 2013 from http://www.lta.gov.sg/content/ltaweb/en/public-transport/projects/circle-line.html
3. Cheam, J. (29 Jan 2013). Singapore's population could hit 6.9m by 2030, with Singaporean core, retrieved on 9 October 2013 from http://news.asiaone.com/News/Latest+News/Singapore/Story/A1Story20130129-398617.html
4. Levies & Quotas For Hiring Foreign Workers (9 October 2013), retrieved on 10 October 2013 from http://www.mom.gov.sg/foreign-manpower/foreign-worker-levies/Pages/levies-quotas-for-hiring-foreign-workers.aspx
5. Linking Population, Poverty and Development (n.d) retrieved on 9 October 2013 from http://www.unfpa.org/pds/migration.html
6. MRT and LRT trains (n.d) on 9 October 2013 from http://www.lta.gov.sg/content/ltaweb/en/public-transport/mrt-and-lrt-trains.html
7. Population Density (n.d) retrieved on 9 October 2013 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_density
8. Singapore Democratic Party (n.d). Building A People, retrieved on 9 October 2013 from http://yoursdp.org/_ld/0/8_Building_a_Peop.pdf
9. Reuters, T. (7 Feb 2013). Singapore Plans Rare Portest as Population Debate RagesI, retrieved on 9 October 2013 from http://www.newsmaxworld.com/Asia/singapore-protest-population-debate/2013/02/06/id/489104
10. Travel Smart (6 Aug 2013), retrieved on 9 October 2013 from http://www.lta.gov.sg/content/ltaweb/en/public-transport/mrt-and-lrt-trains/travel-smart.html