What is the Landscape Industry Productivity Roadmap?
The National Parks Board (NParks) has formulated a dedicated Industry Productivity Roadmap aimed at transforming the landscape industry, with the goal of improving productivity by 2.5% per annum over the next 10 years. NParks will target the two major segments of the industry – Landscape Maintenance and Construction, and Nursery – and focus its measures on raising the skills level of the workforce and restructuring industry operations. The eight key thrusts are summarised below:
- Raise the skill level of the industry workforce
Apprenticeship scheme NParks is developing an Apprenticeship scheme in partnership with WDA. It is aimed at creating a career progression path within the industry and will also complement the efforts of the Ministry of Education to offer students more alternate pathways. The scheme will develop supervisors at the managerial level, and at the trade level, improve the technical skills of workers. . More importantly, the scheme will also help raise salaries for lower wage workers in the industry. Over a 10-year period from 2010 to 2019, NParks targets to produce around 1,100 graduates, comprising of 100 Master Tradesmen, 200 Supervising Tradesmen and 800 Landscape Tradesmen.
Facilitate training of foreign workers NParks is exploring the possibility of training foreign workers in their country of origin through a CUGE-quality assured local training facility, so that workers will arrive in Singapore with an assured level of basic skills. NParks has so far identified four potential countries for this scheme – Mauritius, Sri Lanka, India and East Timor.
Improve management know-how NParks is working with management and human resource specialists to develop and implement training programmes specifically contextualised to meet the needs of the landscape industry’s small to medium enterprises (SMEs).
- Restructure industry operations
Improve company work processes NParks will identify 20 to 30 leading landscape companies to determine existing gaps in their work processes (including human resource practices and systems technology). In particular, NParks will facilitate enterprise productivity audits and the development of enterprise training plans.
Strengthen buyer-contractor partnerships Leveraging on its position as a major landscape maintenance service buyer in the public sector, NParks will further develop Best Sourcing Initiatives through actions such as the consolidation of training programmes and creation of more extensive outreach programmes. NParks will also encourage other buyers in the civil service to adopt the BSI contracting arrangement.
Facilitate mechanisation and technology uptake While recognising that not all processes can be mechanised, those that can should be encouraged. Companies should also be encouraged to adopt technology to make work processes more efficient. NParks has identified the key factors in the current low usage of mechanisation and technology, and will address them accordingly. The issues include low cost foreign labour, low skill levels and limited financing options.
Nursery land accreditation scheme A minimum strategic buffer of plant supply in Singapore needs to be maintained. While land sites are safeguarded for nurseries, it is important for these nurseries to be highly productive, given our land scarcity. The nursery land accreditation scheme will provide an objective benchmark framework to measure labour, management and land productivity. Under this scheme, nurseries will be required to meet minimum best practice benchmarks in order to retain the rights to operate.
Provide productivity leadership NParks has set up a dedicated productivity team which will be tasked with undertaking and managing a suite of initiatives to provide the industry with leadership in driving productivity gains. These initiatives include further development of industry benchmarks, the establishment of a comprehensive measurement system to track productivity performance, outreach and promotion efforts.
