SPEECH BY DR VIVIAN BALAKRISHNAN, MINISTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT AND WATER RESOURCES, AT EARTHLINK NTU’s GREENFEST SYNERGY 2015, ON 23 MARCH 2015, 11.40AM

Never again in our lifetime will one man’s values and vision have such an impact on a people and a place.

Friends, ladies and gentlemen,

We all woke up this morning to the bad news. And obviously, one of the considerations was which events do we proceed with as planned, and which do we postpone or reschedule or cancel.

I enjoyed the ‪#‎FOSSASIA‬ conference today with fellow geeks, developers and advocates of the ‪#‎OpenSource‬ community. Had some fun showing how NEA’s latest APIs on air quality could be accessed using simple self-taught Javascript in the Node Red system.

I believe in ‪#‎OpenData‬ and #OpenSource tools. They help build credibility and trust in government data and systems, especially when provided in real time. Even more crucial, they allow us to take collective ownership of the challenges confronting our society, and co-create solutions together. This is how we build a more innovative ecosystem, with fertile ground for entrepreneurs and enterprises. Ideas can flourish, compete and combine in novel ways. We can build a more open, transparent society with a right balance between cooperation and competition.

SmartNation - Empowering Everyone Everything Everywhere

We are living through a once-in-a-lifetime revolution.

Cloud computing, mobile devices, ubiquitous communications and sensors, robotics, 3D manufacturing, big data analytics and social media are causing a revolution in the way we live, learn, work, play, interact and organise our society.

These developments present enormous opportunities if we systematically empower ourselves with the new tools, new skills, new institutions and new infrastructure needed for the digital age.

We gather here with deep gratitude and affection to celebrate the life of Professor Arthur Lim – a man who restored sight to so many and transformed our lives. Like all of you, I can say with absolute certainty that my life’s trajectory would have been very different if not for Arthur. For 30 years, he was always there for me at almost every single significant turning point in my life.

By day, he has to deal with the haze, floods and other acts of God, but by night, Environment and Water Resources Minister Vivian Balakrishnan is a self-confessed techie who fixes his own gadgets.

As a boy, he began by hacking computer games.

“As far as games were concerned, I wasn’t very good at them,” he said with a laugh.

“I learnt to program in order to hack the games,” said Dr Balakrishnan, 53.

Speech by Dr Vivian Balakrishnan, Minister for the Environment and Water Resources, Committee of Supply Debate, 11 March 2014 (Section A)

Date Published: 11 Mar 2014

1.      Mdm Chair, my colleagues in NEA, PUB and MEWR have had a very busy year. In the space of 12 months, we have had to confront the worst haze episode ever; the worst dengue outbreak ever; we still had a couple of localised flash floods to deal with, and now we have the most prolonged dry spell ever. February has been the driest month on record and also the windiest month on record. We seem to be bent on breaking new records all the time.