[1] In the late nineteenth century Singapore had a large gender imbalance, with the male population greatly outnumbering the female.
[3] This combined with the city's rapid economic development,[2] resulting in prostitution becoming a flourishing business and brothels a boom industry.
Women's rights activist Shirin Fozdar described Singapore as "one big brothel"[15] and the city was a regional centre for prostitution.
The People's Action Party under the leadership by Lee Kuan Yew initially banned prostitution when they came to power in the late 1950s, switching to a strategy of containment in the mid 1960s.
[16] From the 1950s to the early 1980s Bugis Street was famous for its nightly adult-themed shows performed by transvestites and groups of prostitutes would also openly solicit there.
[17] Neighbouring Johore Road was also part of the red-light district in the 1960s and the 1970s, with transgender prostitutes soliciting for business in the shophouses and alleys.
[40] Police unofficially tolerate and monitor a limited number of brothels, where the prostitutes are regularly screened for health check-ups.
[45] Massage parlours that provide sexual services and other commercial sex-related activities were also appearing in suburban areas such as Woodlands, Sembawang, Sengkang, Jurong West, Yishun, Chinatown and River Valley.
[46][47] In response the Government of Singapore began looking at various options for regulating and punishing violations such as cases of unlicensed prostitution and the operation of brothels.
In 2016, examples of sentencing included the case of a man who was jailed for 85 months and fined S$130,000 for organising online prostitution[48] and evading nearly S$27,000 of income tax.
[49] In 2015 there were also reported cases of nightly sex activities involving transvestite prostitutes soliciting at a car park in the old Woodlands Town Garden which is adjacent to the Johor-Singapore Causeway.
[51] In 2016 Member of Parliament Halimah Yacob announced a series of proposals involving the National Parks Board to address concerns about the area.
[53] There has been an illegal trade in women and girls unwillingly trafficked into Singapore's brothels since the beginning of the nineteenth century.
Some of the 965,000 foreign work permit holders that comprise more than one-quarter of Singapore's total labor force are vulnerable to trafficking; most victims migrate willingly.
Foreign women sometimes arrive in Singapore with the intention of engaging in prostitution, but under the threat of serious harm or other forms of coercion, they become victims of sex trafficking.