Singapore announces fourth stimulus package against COVID-19
Singapore (VNA) – Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister of Singapore
Heng Swee Keat on May 26 announced another 33 billion SGD (23.2 billion USD)
supplementary budget, aimed primarily at helping workers and businesses to tide
over the COVID-19 crisis and the bleak economic outlook ahead.
Keat said the Fortitude Budget, the fourth
in less than four months, sets aside 2.9 billion SGD to extend job protection,
including enhancements to the Job Support Scheme that co-pays salaries to help
firms retain workers.
It also provides for the 3.8 billion SGD that went towards
measures announced on April 21 to tide Singaporeans over the four-week
extension to the 'circuit breaker' to control the spread of coronavirus by
limiting people's movements.
The Government will also step up public
services and recruit more workers to meet long-term demand for preschool
education and health care.
Of the total four stimulus packages, the
Singaporean Government has so far earmarked 92.9 billion SGD, or 19.2 percent
of the country’s gross domestic product, in order to cope with the COVID-19
impact./.