Singapore, being a relatively small nation, faces immense pressure to win at sports, particularly Olympic gold medals. To encourage athletes from Singapore to compete and earn medals at these competitions, Singaporean government offers various incentives such as its multi-million dollar award programme that rewards any Olympic gold medal winner with 1 million dollars – but can this truly encourage athleticism when the country cannot even field an adequate football team?
Although this nation is small, it still remains wealthy enough for a significant level of wealth. Therefore, they should be able to afford items to assist its athletes – however the government is using taxpayers’ money on giving out large sums to individual athletes instead of investing it into improving sporting infrastructure and nutrition for its athletes; something the government already does but the results won’t compare with handing out millions to just one athlete.
Singapore’s SGP Prize can provide players with an incentive to compete, but should remain reasonable so as to not create an unfair playing environment. When representing their nation through sport they should be recognized with some form of reward; it would be unjustifiable, however, to offer large sums of money just because an event could be won by anyone.
Notable too is that Singapore offers more money in prizes for competing at this event compared to other nations; Finland only receives two million as its top prize.
The NUS Singapore History Prize was established in 2014 with generous support from an anonymous donor and honors works that explore Singaporean history while making it more accessible for non-academic audiences. Beginning this year, this prize will now be awarded every three years with multimedia/artistic works added as a new category alongside books for consideration.
Woon Tai Ho was awarded the 2023 NUS Singapore History Prize for his book The Soul of Ink: Lim Tze Peng at 100, while Khir Johari took home the Merit prize with The Food of Singapore Malays: Gastronomic Travels Through the Archipelago. Submittals for the 2025 Singapore Gender Prize are now open – authors and publishers should submit their works by 15 May 2025 for consideration; winners will be announced 31 August 2025. SUSS encourages applicants to explore its theme based around Singapore spirit’s values of diversity, inclusivity, religious harmony meritocracy and resilience – before 15 May 2025 submission deadline!
