By Toh Hsien Min

It may not have escaped everyone's attention that this issue of QLRS is being prepared during the campaigning for a momentous election.  The incumbent party, led by a technocrat and past public servant only recently appointed to replace a long-serving Prime Minister and lead the party, has to face off against a strong opposition hoisting its blue colours as well as a host of smaller parties trying to distinguish themselves in shades of yellow and green.  The incumbent party, while broadly competent, has seen its support weaken after a series of scandals, while the opposition has grown in strength off the back of populist messages.  And then comes Donald Trump starting a global trade war, and all of a sudden the electorate decides that all is forgiven and returns to government... Mark Carney and the Liberal Party of Canada.

Whoever did you think I was referring to?

Ah, so.  Well, you see, QLRS is apolitical, so all we will say to Singapore citizens reading this is to take the 2025 Singapore General Election seriously and vote for the party you think will make a positive difference to your lives.

But ask me again next year what my abiding memory of April 2025 is and I will likely answer Trump's tariffs.  In the early part of the month, that was all anybody could talk about, even people not directly involved in commerce or financial markets - lawyers and tech developers all had a view.  Mostly the reaction was bewilderment, for why the United States would upend economic orthodoxy and rip up the rules-based global trading order that America itself had helped to establish.  There were all manner of theories floated - shakedown theories, insider trading conspiracy theories, negotiation hardball - but what everyone seemed to agree on was that, as announced, the tariffs would damage economies and supply chains around the world.  Within a week, financials markets had reacted so badly - led by a record swing in the 10-year Treasury yield from 3.991% at its 4 April close to an intra day high of 4.515% on 9 April - that Trump was forced to climb down with a 90-day tariff pause on most countries and a reduction of the tariff rate to a universal 10% on all countries excluding China, for which mutual escalation led to the US tariff on Chinese imports rising to as high as 145% and the Chinese tariff on US goods rising to 125%.  Although by 23 April, Trump said, without giving specifics, that the China tariffs will "come down significantly, but it won't be zero", the foot has already been shot; people, companies and governments around the world are now looking at the US with new eyes and planning for a future with less of the US in it.

Obviously, it matters to me professionally as a risk professional in a trade finance fintech (disclaimer: this entire editorial is my personal view and not to be misunderstood as representing my company's view), but it's worth taking a view beyond the fifty states.  why does this matter beyond whether an individual manufacturing company in China can send a container-load of consumer electronics across the Pacific to the Port of Los Angeles to supply shops in suburban malls fishing for the purchasing power of the American consumer?  Because trade is the primary means we have of uplifting the wellbeing of societies, particularly emerging economies and SME companies seeking to grow and create employment and wealth.  By focussing on what we are good at, whether it's growing rice or making integrated circuits, and exchanging what we produce efficiently for what others produce efficiently, we increase aggregate wellbeing among trade participants.  (Imagine the converse scenario, where we have to grow rice in Singapore because we cannot trade with our neighbours!)  While one can make the case that not all trade is all good for our societies, it is hard to oppose the notion that no trade is no good for everybody.

The commerce that QLRS deals in is the commerce of ideas, and here we remain open for business.  This issue is no different from any other in engagements between Singaporean writers and writers from Hong Kong, the Philippines and even one with (by coincidence) a China-US heritage.  In particular, Kelly Chan's poems take on the task of deconstructing Chinese characters into English lines, Jonathan Chan in his essay on the Singapore anthology outlines the tradition of incorporating trading partners such as Australia and Italy, while our Criticism section leads with a review of a poet who lives in... Canada, where else?

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