Dear SILA members and friends,
Time has just flown by as we are approaching the end of another roller-coaster year full of ups and downs, joys and surprises, disruptions and transformations, disappointments and successes. The year has not been easy, with the pandemic becoming endemic. The path to this transition was dotted with many twists and turns, taking its toll on us as individuals, communities, businesses, and the profession at large. It is also a good time for SILA to pause and deliberate on what we have done well, where we could have done better and which parts we have to work harder in the coming year.
We embraced the digital platform further this year and rolled out many exciting webinars and sharing with our members and the community. In addition, there were hybrid events and conferences accessible locally and globally, providing engaging presentations and interesting conversations across a range of subjects both directly and indirectly related to the profession of landscape architecture. It also provided us with a glimpse of what the future holds for us as landscape architects and where we as a profession need to move forward.
We rallied our members and the public to come together and reinforce the value of saving our environment and keeping our waters clean through our Kayak N Klean events this year. The three editions of the event were well received, with very encouraging feedback. Many of our members and partners also participated in the ‘One Million Trees Movement’ tree planting initiative by NParks to kickstart SILA’s contribution. It is only the start, and we hope to see many trees planted by our community in the coming months. We will continue to provide similar opportunities to engage in meaningful actions towards building a sustainable and resilient city for one and all in the new year.
We continued our persistent pursuit to highlight the challenges faced by our practices and the businesses during these testing times to the Ministry of National Development. In addition, we reinforced the invaluable expertise of landscape architects as multi-disciplinary professionals to play a critical role in leading the vision of Singapore’s ‘City in Nature’.
We continue to review the Accreditation requirements and means to help our Recognised Practices maintain their SILA RP status by getting their principals and senior members accredited at the earliest. We will be sharing more updates on this in the first quarter of next year. On this note, I would remind our Members, Accredited Members and ABC Waters Professionals to declare your CPD points for the year and renew your subscriptions and memberships on time.
I would also like to extend my deep appreciation to our members who contributed their valuable time and expertise at various focus group discussions, engagement sessions and workshops organised by the public agencies to gather industry inputs on planning the strategies for the future. There will be many more such sessions in the coming year, and we hope to have your continued support and participation.
Do look forward to the SLAA event in 2022! The organising committee will share more information and details on the submission categories, requirements, and schedules in the coming months. We hope that with local Covid-19 conditions stabilising and the country slowly returning to the new normal, we can have an in-person event in the coming year to celebrate the achievements of our recognised practices.
Let us collectively pray and hope for a brighter future ahead with an end to the global pandemic crisis soon and let us continue to strengthen our support for each other during these testing times in our professional endeavours. On behalf of SILA Council, I sincerely wish all members and partners a Blessed Christmas and a Healthy New Year ahead in 2022.
Srilalitha Gopalakrishnan
President
Singapore Institute of Landscape Architects (SILA)