SINGAPORE — Companies here are still a far cry away from making sustainable improvements in the nation’s push for greater productivity growth, but the Government should not tighten its manpower policies further as businesses are struggling to cope with the pace of restructuring, the chief executive of the Singapore Business Federation (SBF) said yesterday.

Commenting on Singapore’s progress towards achieving the target of growing productivity by 2 to 3 per cent annually by 2020, Mr Ho Meng Kit said he saw “no light at the end of the tunnel yet”.

“What we want to tell the Government is that we think restructuring is important, but we have some questions over its pace, and we do hope the Government will not tighten manpower policies any further. A lot of companies are already facing a lot of difficulties, and we don’t think the Government should add on to that. That’s our message to the Government.”

Mr Ho made the comments at a press conference for the National Productivity Month (NPM) campaign, which will take place between Oct 7 and 30. A slew of training programmes, exhibitions and study trips will be held to highlight productivity solutions in the manufacturing, healthcare, retail, food services, hospitality, accountancy and construction sectors.

Co-organised by the SBF and Singapore National Employers’ Federation with support from various trade associations and government agencies, the inaugural NPM marks the latest public and private sector efforts to restructure Singapore’s economy and reduce reliance on manpower.

But progress in the productivity push has been slow, as sectors such as construction and food services continue to lag behind, Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam said on Wednesday. The two sectors are among the industries that have suffered productivity declines in the past few years despite support from government schemes such as Productivity Innovation Credit and Innovation and Capability Vouchers.

Overall, labour productivity fell 1.3 per cent in the second quarter from the corresponding period last year, after rising just 0.7 per cent in the first three months of the year. From 2010 to 2013, labour productivity rose a marginal 0.2 per cent a year.