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**Module 13 - Southeast Asia****Singapore's Virtual Elimination of Poverty** = = = = = = ==

  Singapore is an island city-state that is located in the southern region of the Malay Peninsula. In August of 1965 Singapore became an independent republic (after attempting to merge with Malaya, Sabah, and Sarawak to form Malaysia in 1963 after their break from Britain). Singapore, in its history, has had a large struggle with poverty. It has only been in the last 30 to 40 years that they have seen drastic changes in their gross domestic product, and have been able to change their reputation. Singapore has many positive attributes that not recently have been used to change this poverty status, such as: being surrounded by water, being independent and having a stable government, and having a lush, tropical rainforest climate good for marketing (food, trade, rarity).

Once Singapore became an independent republic, they were able to focus on many domestic issues, and therefore began the change to end poverty. Some of the ways they began to conquer poverty are listed below. Different ways included starting public homeownership programs, learning about resource conservation, expanding their ports, and using their already developed market economy to bring in more GDP. Also, there were many great minds that helped to create the different programs used to better Singapore's economy, one being Albert Winsemius (listed in detail below).

Over the last 35 years, Singapore has made tremendous progress, increasing their economy by an average of 5% every year over the last 9 years (being brought down only because of 2008's small perctange due to the economic recession). By using all of these different programs/tactics, Singapore was not only able to rise out of third world status, but now has a higher reputation to obtain: having the highest per capita in the world! = =

=Public Housing= = = =Resource Conservation= = = =Singapore's Ports = =International Trade= =Albert Winsemius - Dutch Economist=