(SINGAPORE) Barring a deterioration in the local lending climate and unforeseen economic developments, Spring Singapore does not think it will have to repeat a move it made in 2009, when it rolled out additional loan programmes to boost financing to small- and medium-sized enterprises here.

The government agency said yesterday that it expects the number of loans and loan value it provides to SMEs here to hold steady or even fall in 2012 from 2011, when it made 5,181 loans totalling $1.4 billion.

This is in contrast to the $6 billion it provided to 14,252 SMEs in 2009 and $2.7 billion to 9,748 SMEs in 2010, at the height of the financial crisis. The two years saw the agency introduce a new loan programme on top of three existing schemes as credit tightened, and firms here found it hard to gain access to much-needed financing. Called the Bridging Loan Programme, it was withdrawn in February last year.

Speaking at Spring's 2011 enterprise development review yesterday, CEO Png Cheong Boon said: 'I think if the economy is doing fine and there are no unforeseen circumstances then ... the level may be around there.'

He noted that commercial lending has come back into the market in 2011, and companies are able to tap into it to meet their needs.

In fact, the local banks are flush with cash and would 'love to give a loan because the interest rates are very low today', said Spring chairman Philip Yeo.

'One advantage of Singapore is that our local banks are financially strong. They are capitally strong, so they should be able and are still able to loan ... so the hope is that they will continue to release loans.'

Still, Spring said it is ready to boost its loan programmes should the need arise, and that it is watching the situation very closely.

Said Mr Yeo: 'We have all the financing instruments there, if we need we can relax it and go back to 2009, 2010 ... so all the instruments are there.... (but) if the banks are willing to loan and they are doing it then there's no need for us to worry.'

Thus far, SMEs have not complained about a lack of access to financing, said Spring. Previously mentioned as the biggest challenge faced by SMEs, some recent studies show that issues such as labour have overtaken financing as the top concern.

Still, financing remains a key obstacle that SMEs face. The latest SME Index released by the Singapore Business Federation (SBF) and DP Information Group show that SMEs expect access to funding to remain difficult in the first half of this year, giving it an index reading of 5 - an improvement from the 4.88 registered for the first half of 2010 but lower than last year's reading of 5.14.

Readings from the previous years excluded the construction and engineering industry, which was included in this year's survey.

At yesterday's review, Spring also said it supported the projects of some 3,900 SMEs last year and gave out grants totalling $98 million. The projects are expected to create 15,250 jobs and generate $4.4 billion in value-add for the economy when fully implemented in the next three years.

Mr Png said he expects the agency to support the same number of SMEs this year, if not slightly more.

It also disbursed a portion of the $223 million that was set aside to fund productivity plans in the retail, food services, food manufacturing and furniture industries over a five-year period. Spring said it did not have details on the funds used so far, as two of the four plans were only rolled out late last year. Launched in 2011, the productivity initiative is expected to help the four sectors address challenges, such as automation and adoption of productivity improvement tools, product innovation, and workforce investment.