Deputy Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, in a speech to Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) scholarship recipients, said the reality of a globalised market was that many students would be offered well-paying jobs before they graduated.

"If this happens to you, you will have to decide how to respond ... but never forget at the end of the day, your duties and priorities lie in Singapore," said Lee, the MAS chairman.

Singapore, he said, was not like China, where tens of thousands of students have gone overseas to study and most have stayed on in the West.

China, desperate for people with knowledge and skills to modernise its economy, can afford to get one student back for every three or four who study overseas, he said.

"Singapore also has to send some of our best students abroad ... but Singapore cannot afford to send three or four top students abroad and get one back.

"We do not have that wealth of talent, that base of 1.2 billion people that China has. With us every person counts."

Lee said that with the MAS scholarship went a "solemn undertaking ... from you to do well in your studies, and upon graduation, to contribute in full measure to MAS and to Singapore."