Raffles' vision...

Soon after he set up a British trading post in Singapore in 1819, Sir Stamford Raffles summarised with characteristic clarity and vision what he hoped to achieve. “Our object is not territory but trade,” he wrote, “a great commercial Emporium, and a fulcrum whence we may extend our influence politically…"

He turned an obscure village into an international centre for trade and financial services.

The GDP of Singapore rose 15.5 % in the second quarter of 2013, (0.6% in the UK!).