No Home-grown Entrepreneurs? No Big Deal

FF Fashion

Fri, Apr 24, 2009
The Straits Times
By JEREMY AU YONG


IT DOES not matter if Singapore does not produce its own entrepreneurs. That was the stark point made by former Economic Development Board chairman Chan Chin Bock yesterday when asked about the country's apparent inability to produce its own successful companies.

Mr Chan argued that as long as a company is yielding 'social benefits', like providing jobs and adhering to good governance, it should not matter whether it is a multinational corporation (MNC), a government-linked company, or a local enterprise.

Referring to a Singaporean economist based at the University of Michigan, he said: 'As Linda Lim says, we have to think in terms of growth being for people, not people for growth.'

Based on that principle, he said, he could not understand why people were concerned about the lack of home-grown entrepreneurs. That concern has been expressed by, among others, Professor Lim herself.

Mr Chan said: 'To me, I can't understand the logic of that. What does it matter as long as in governance terms, to the community, to the workers, to the country, if all the deliverables are there, the jobs are there, the good governance is there and all that. At the top, why do you want to worry about the shape of the deliverer, whether it is an MNC?'

He added: 'Don't forget that you can have an MNC that performs a very good social function, and you can have a local entrepreneur that performs the worst social function.'