SINGAPORE — Singapore will raise retirement age to 65 and re-employment age to 70 from Jan 1, 2029, a year ahead of the 2030 timeline, as part of six recommendations to help seniors remain in the workforce longer.

Announced today by the Tripartite Workgroup on Senior Employment (TWG-SE), the recommendations aim to help more seniors remain in meaningful, sustainable employment, while promoting age-diverse, multi-generational workplaces. 

This comes amid an ageing workforce, with the proportion of Singapore's resident labour force aged 50 and above rising from 34 per cent to 40 per cent over the past decade, according to the Ministry of Manpower. 

Speaking at the launch conference today, Minister of State for Manpower Dinesh Vasu Dash said employers should adapt jobs and workplaces to give older workers more options to remain in the workforce.

"We hope for our seniors to also upskill themselves to be able to deal with jobs and look at careers as a multi-staged perspective," said Dinesh, adding that creating age-inclusive workplaces would benefit both employers and workers.

"Ultimately, we want to create age inclusive workplaces in Singapore where we are able to then extract the maximum we can for our business and at the same time to support our workers.”

The event was also attended by NTUC deputy secretary-general Desmond Tan, and other guests, who were invited to a walkthrough of the digital booths and NTUC's e2i career pulse workshop.

To expand flexible employment opportunities for older workers, the workgroup recommended introducing a new Flexi-Load Programme (FLP) to help employers create and expand part-time and fractional roles.

The programme will help employers defray the transitional costs of introducing such arrangements, including redesigning jobs, systems and policies traditionally structured around full-time work.

The FLP will also replace the existing part-time re-employment grant when it expires at the end of 2027.