By Fiona Chan

THE declining productivity of Singapore's workers is likely to be a key issue tackled by the Economic Strategies Committee (ESC) when it releases its recommendations in January.

This will be a problem the government-led panel - chaired by Finance Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam and set up to find new ways for Singapore to grow over the medium term - should address, say economists.

For any economy, labour is a key ingredient in creating output and growth. To raise output through labour, an economy can either keep increasing the number of workers forever - which is not viable in the long term - or, preferably, raise the amount of output from each worker.

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