have you ever wondered just how
singapore actually survives as an
independent city-state with the total
area smaller than new york city how
singapore survives is not just a
question of how it stays independent but
also how you feed a city when the entire
country is just that city yet singapore
famously isn't just surviving but
thriving being possibly one of the most
influential countries in the asia
pacific region but given how countries
of this kind of status usually have you
know land area just how does singapore
survive
how does this government work how do its
institutions work is it divided into
different subdivisions yes it is and how
does the country feed its five million
people
this video is sponsored by fabulous
singapore is widely touted as the
world's only true functioning city-state
after all vatican city is just a private
country for a bunch of incels and monaco
is still very much dependent on france
singapore however wasn't always meant to
be a country before 1957 the british
administered various colonies in this
general area with all except brunei
eventually uniting into the federation
of malaysia however just two years later
in 1965 singapore was effectively kicked
out of this federation making singapore
in a sense the country that didn't
initially want to be a country if
however there were any city that could
thrive as an independent country it
would definitely be singapore
singapore's geography is far from
perfect we'll get to that later but it
does have a certain amount of blessings
the most obvious of course is its
position directly at the end of the
street of malacca putting it at one of
the world's primary choke points for
international shipping with singapore
growing to become one of the richest and
most developed countries in the world
but despite the impression you might
have gotten from my videos geography
doesn't always determine everything as
this could theoretically also have been
the fate of batom a mere stone's throw
away from singapore assuming you can
throw a stone 17 kilometers as singapore
spent much of its adolescence as a much
poorer country
through a myriad of measures taken by
the government over the decades however
the country started to attract the
attention of multinational corporations
and invest in new sectors
nowadays boasting one of the highest
gdps per capita in the world however
this video is about how singapore
survives not how it became rich which i
guess is my gentle way of saying i'm not
an economist and i know i will swear
word something up with this part since
it's not actually the focus of the video
okay so first singapore has subdivisions
like states and provinces
good guess but actually no singapore is
a city but of course still a large one
and just as it's more efficient to
divide london into boroughs or berlin to
boroughs or new york into boroughs
singapore is primarily divided into five
community developed council or cdc
districts each with names i hopefully
don't have to explain the meaning of
singapore can also be divided into town
councils themselves further divided into
constituencies which are divided by the
elections department under the control
of the prime minister's office
at the national level singapore's
government is divided into an executive
legislative and judicial branch
singapore has a president and a prime
minister with the former serving as the
head of state and the latter is the head
of governments the president's currently
halime yokob serves a six-year term
which can be renewed and is elected by
popular vote the prime minister
currently lee shen long is appointed by
the president as the mp who might best
sway the current parliament singapore's
government is defined as a unitary
parliamentary republic being a unitary
state means the government effectively
has the final say on what goes on
anywhere within its borders whereas
federal states generally leave more of
the responsibility to the subdivisions
over what happens within their borders
parliamentary in this context is
government effectively formed by
whichever party or coalition of parties
forms a majority in parliament and
republic is a convoluted term okay i
already made that joke in my chinese
government video singapore is in a
unique position sort of physically and
metaphorically because this whole being
independent and actually thriving thing
is not necessarily something that most
major cities might be able to pull off
singapore however has not only thrived
as a city-state but also has a fighting
chance it's not like the city stays in
the civilization games they actually do
a lot of stuff diplomatically singapore
maintains close ties with many of the
world's most powerful nations while also
staying neutral in world affairs
maintaining somewhat of a neutral street
that i'm sure makes the likes of
switzerland say meh i'm neutral about it
singapore is known for its close
friendships with both the us and china
relations between singapore and the us
date all the way back to 1836 when the
us opened a consulate there back when
singapore was a british trading post and
the us only barely touched the pacific
singapore and china meanwhile have
shared diplomatic relations since as
relatively recently as 1990 with
singaporean leadership generally
believing working with china to be an
imperative for any country based in
this general area
since then they have been able to
maintain generally amicable relations
with both powers at the same time
the reason singapore is in a position to
prevent world powers without being
imposed on by either one is largely due
to its strong economy making it a
desirable partner singapore also
maintains a strong military having the
ninth largest military budget in asia
and spending more on its military than
any other country in southeast asia the
singapore armed forces are also allowed
use of facilities in many different
countries around the world mainly for
training purposes
as the country is a massive center of
business and finance with many large
banks being based in singapore
singapore you could probably imagine is
a country that very much wants a stable
world this is obvious though we can see
the effects first hand with hong kong
with multinational corporations often
known to move out whenever china starts
making incursions
hey wait a minute why isn't mr b made a
hong kong versus singapore video yet
compared to some of the largest cities
on souls 3 singapore isn't actually all
that big with the population of 5.6
million sure it's nothing to sneeze at i
mean there's probably a fine for that
but being a country with less land area
than new york city yet still supporting
such a large population the question
becomes how does singapore get food and
water to its citizens
if you could turn every last square
meter of singapore's land area into
farmland singapore could produce enough
food annually for 3.6 million people so
this plan wouldn't work because 2
million singaporeans would still go
hungry also not all of singapore's land
is even arable in the first place
also where would everyone live and work
if all the housing and businesses were
leveled into farmland also this idea
would be incredibly stupid so yes aside
from ambitious plans to produce as much
as 30 of its food by 2030 obviously
singapore imports most of its food
though not necessarily all from malaysia
singapore does produce some of its own
food however around 90 of their food
comes from everywhere from china to
australia to europe and the americas
eggs mainly come from malaysia though
chicken may also come from brazil as
does pork alongside indonesia beef
mainly comes from australia and also
youtube though fish and rice come from
closer to home in thailand vietnam
indonesia and india
the water on the other hand that's
pretty much all from malaysia
the two countries signed two different
agreements back when they were one
country an agreement signed between the
city council of singapore and the state
of johor in 1961 allowed singapore to
draw an unrestricted quantity of raw
water from the tabrao and skudai rivers
in exchange for 12 percent of the
filtered water while this agreement
expired in 2011 a 1962 agreement set to
expire in 2061 allows singapore to
extract just under 1 million liters of
raw water per day from the johor river
in exchange for 2 percent of the filter
water this imported water is one of
singapore's so-called four national taps
the others being desalinated water water
from local catchment and reclaimed water
under the name new water
having virtually no natural resources of
its own singapore serves as an
interesting inverse example of the
resource curse a phenomenon where
resource-rich countries think
afghanistan and dr congo tend to also be
poor and unstable either way while we
might call it singapore perhaps we
should call it sing a rich okay i
literally made that joke about three
years ago jesus christ
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