Remarks by Minister Desmond Lee at the Kick-off Tree Planting Activity for Raffles Institution’s 1823 Trees Campaign

Jun 4, 2022

A very good morning to all of you. Delighted to be here together with my alma mater as well as fellow alumni to launch this tree planting movement that will work its way towards our Bicentennial as a school, as an institution.

We are planting at a very historic location. Not too long ago, we commemorated Singapore's bicentennial – 200 years since our founding by Sir Stamford Raffles, and next year we mark the bicentennial of our alma mater. A very important milestone, not just to commemorate the past, but to re-establish this confidence for the future, in an increasingly uncertain world.

This is a historic site because it is Fort Canning. It’s the place where Sir Stamford Raffles began our first botanic gardens. As we marked Singapore's Bicentennial, we made it a point to also mark the first botanic gardens. The first botanic gardens forms part of the Fort Canning Master Plan to commemorate and recognise Fort Canning as an extremely historic part of Singapore. It is tied in intricately to our early origins, to our history, when we were founded by Sir Stamford Raffles, and all the way back – 800 years to the history of early Singapore. There are lots of historic locations here on this hill, that bring our history all the way back some 800 years, including an archeological dig at the foothills of Fort Canning. Year after year, Singaporean archaeologists continue to find relics of the past, of Singapore as a vibrant trading centre, a growing settlement that was confident in this region, but being part of different empires, until ultimately, when we became independent Singapore.

And where we are is the approximate site of Raffles House where Sir Stamford Raffles, who was an avid a botanist and also a zoologist, took samples from Singapore and around the region, to study the flora and fauna of Singapore and Southeast Asia. Not only was he establishing settlements all around the region, but he was also an avid botanist and zoologist as well. So that is the significance of this planting today.

We are pragmatists and forward looking, but you must always be sentimental people – sentiments, memories, pride in our traditions, create institutions, create the values, and hold the values in the institutions. This allows us to power forward with confidence, knowing that we are firm in our foundation. And so, acts of tradition like today, are important, and will be seared in all our memories, especially our next generation of Rafflesians. That as you, in turn, take our place in future in society, you will continue to remember the past, in order to encourage the next generation after you to look forward with pride and confidence.

Mr Lee Kuan Yew was also a Rafflesian. He believed that greening Singapore was important for many reasons. For practical reasons, it will make Singapore much cooler in our tropical climate. It will make Singapore more beautiful, including to foreign investors, at a time when he was keen to have anchor in Singapore to create jobs for many people that he was responsible for. So very pragmatic, but he was also a high idealist. He had lofty ambitions, and he believed in the idea of equality. Back then, if you cast yourself back, if you can, as students of history. Singapore was newly emergent – from colony, newly emergent as an independent country, uncertain whether we would make it as an independent Singapore, and as its leader he felt that the locals’ areas were not as great as the areas where the former masters used to live. Therefore, he wanted to green all of Singapore, for all Singaporeans – to be on an equal footing, as confident people, masters of our own destiny. He wanted to green the country and believed that a city that was blighted by steel, by iron, by concrete, by glass, would be bad for the soul. A city that was newly established as a city-state – and in fact, today, the only sovereign city-state in the world, being green all throughout its urban setting, made for wellness, created the setting for people to feel that this is a liveable, sustainable city.

In a way, whilst the world is now very focused on sustainability, we were, in a way, green ahead of our times. And that was not because it was a national agenda on its own that came into being, because back then Singapore had so many concerns. Newly independent, uncertain about survival, our security, uncertain about water, uncertain about whether we could find jobs for so many people, as the British were withdrawing, uncertain about whether we had the resources to care for the vulnerable, resources to do anything for that matter, because we were so new as a country. And notwithstanding all those trials and tribulations, and travails, Mr Lee Kuan Yew felt that it was equally important to start greening, not as a priority to be done later by subsequent generations when resources were there. But he invested heavily – in getting people to go out there, bring the saplings, bring your tools, go out there and plant trees.

Two years ago, my colleagues and I discussed – both in Government, as well as in the Ministry and in NParks. We felt that planting trees, having been a tradition since 1963 – when Mr Lee planted the first Mempat tree in Singapore, to kick-start that movement year after year, that we wanted to plant a million trees in order to get as many Singaporeans as possible – your families, your children, and your grandchildren, to come together and make tree planting a rite of passage, a part of our DNA. It should be, and will be forever more, part of the DNA of being Singapore, because we are proud stewards of a City in Nature, one of the greenest, if not, the greenest city in the world. And some people ask me – can that be so? It is so. It is both locally and externally validated, we are the greenest city in the world. Other cities are green because around the city they have vast amounts of nature. But in Singapore, we are stewards of a very precious condition – where in city-states, everything that we have is within the parameters of the city.

Remembering what we are, and where we headed towards, this stewardship role – it is taught in RI, it is part of the Singapore ethos, and we hope that this flame is passed from generation to generation, and just this act of planting trees alone, cultivating the soil, planting trees, caring for it, understanding its value and its contribution to the environment, to society and to communities – both past and present. This allows us to start to imbibe and incorporate that DNA of stewardship. Not just caring for ourselves or for this generation, but keeping store, building up reserves, building capabilities, strengthening Singapore for future generations, not yet born. And that, and only by doing that, can we secure Singapore’s future, confidently, and way into the future. On that note, thank you for coming today to join us in planting a million trees. Auspicium Melioris Aevi!

Thank you!