"All the experts, the analysts, say that next year will be slower than this year," Lim Boon Heng, secretary-general of the National Trades Union Congress, was reported as saying.

"We should be expecting something like 10,000 (retrenchments) in the future, because of the constant restructuring of the economy," he said.

In the first nine months of this year, more than 6700 people were laid off while in 2003, about 16,300 workers were retrenched which is 15 percent lower than the previous year.

Singapore's export-led economy is tipped to grow 8.0-8.5 percent in 2004 and slow to 3-5 percent the following year due to a slackening global economy.

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