Singapore's Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong on Saturday warned the city-state to brace for more job losses in 2009, although he said the economy did better than the government had feared, according to dpa. "We might see another wave of retrenchments later in the year," Lee said in a speech broadcasted on Singapore's state television on the eve of national day, marking 44 years of independence. Companies like Singapore Airlines, which reported that it expected a significant full-year loss, "are still facing very tough conditions," said Lee. The city-state's unemployment rate jumped to 3.3 per cent, up from 2.5 per cent in December, as Singapore struggles to get out of its worst recession since independence from Malaysia in 1965. The economy shrank by 6.5 per cent in the first half of 2009, Lee said, "a very significant contraction, but less bad than we had feared." In the second quarter, Singapore's export-reliant economy showed signs of a rebound with a 20.4-per-cent expansion over the previous quarter, according to advance estimates. The government revised its forecasts, saying that the economy was now expected to fall between 4 and 6 per cent this year, from an earlier estimate of a contraction up to 9 per cent. "But it is too early to celebrate. The outlook remains clouded," Lee said in his national day message, noting that the advanced economies were not expected to bounce back soon and Singapore's exports remained weaker than last year. The government said it would release final figures for the second quarter on Tuesday.
