The failure of the Fifth WTO Ministerial Conference in Cancun, Mexico, has provided the time that Taiwanese farmers need to transform their business, a top agriculture official said yesterday after returning from the talks.
"The breakdown of the trade talks on agricultural issues is actually not bad news for Taiwan," said Lee Ching-lung (李金龍), chairman of the Council of Agriculture.
"The result has simply given a longer grace period for our farmers to cushion the impact brought by the proposed immediate market opening," Lee said.
Farmers have found it hard to survive in the face of increased tax-free imports following the nation's accession to the WTO in January last year, Lee said.
The council has been promoting "recreational agriculture" through the establishment of bed-and-breakfasts or farming and fishing activities to help the sector branch out into the tourism industry.
During this transformation period, the government has no intention of making further concessions on agricultural issues, except for slight reductions in the subsidies offered to farmers, Lee said.
During the Cancun meeting, Taiwan and nine other like-minded countries formed an alliance called the Group of 10 (G-10), Lee said. The other members include Japan, South Korea, Israel and Switzerland.
The G-10 members agreed to jointly call on their counterparts to apply rules set during the Uruguay Round of trade talks between 1986 and 1993 in future WTO agricultural talks, Lee said.
"We realized that we have to form an alliance with other countries in the WTO, or our voice or interests will be easily ignored," he said.
Aside from the collective appeal of the G-10, Lee said Taiwan, as a new member of the WTO, hopes to strive for a longer grace period for the liberalization of its agricultural market, the longer the better.
According to Lee, during bilateral talks with Japan in Cancun, Japanese lawmaker Shoichi Nakagawa proposed signing a free trade agreement (FTA) with Taiwan.
Lee said such a pact would be welcomed, but there is no timetable yet as the two countries have not scheduled the necessary negotiations.
Lee said FTAs with other countries will become more important if the WTO fails to remain an arena for the international community to solve disagreements.
"We don't want to see that happen, since Taiwan worked hard and long to enter the WTO," Lee said. "But if negotiations in the WTO in the future go nowhere -- the way this conference did -- I believe that many countries will seek FTAs with other countries."
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday obtained the government’s approval to inject an additional US$10.26 billion to finance the construction of its second fab in Kumamoto, Japan, and a second fab in Arizona, using advanced process technologies. The Department of Investment Review approved TSMC’s investment applications on the basis that Taiwan remains a major technology and manufacturing hub for the chipmaker, which makes its most advanced chips at home, the company operates its research-and-development center here and the majority of its capacity remains in Taiwan. The latest capital injections — US$5.26 billion for its Japanese venture Japan Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing
TOP PERFORMER: The computer and optical products sector’s annual increase in output of 31.84 percent was the largest among Taiwan’s six major industries The industrial production index last month increased 16.06 percent year-on-year, rising for a third consecutive month as local manufacturing continued to boom, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Industrial production measures the change in the value of output produced by the local manufacturing, mining and utilities sectors. Last month’s growth, the largest annual expansion in 34 months, came as increases in manufacturing output, water supply, and electricity and gas production more than offset a retreat in mining output, the ministry said in a report. Manufacturing output, which accounted for 95.39 percent of the industrial production index, also rose for a third consecutive
DIVERSIFYING: Following customers’ demand to improve supply chain resilience, ASE is looking for sites in the US, Japan and Mexico, a company executive said ASE Technology Holding Co (ASE, 日月光投控), the world’s biggest chip packaging and testing service provider, yesterday said it plans to launch a new high-end chip testing fab in the US next month to better serve its key customers based in North America, particularly California-based artificial intelligence (AI) customers. The new US testing facility would be operated by the firm’s subsidiary ISE Labs Inc, it said. ASE’s major customers, and high-ranking US officials and representatives from American Institute in Taiwan are to attend the fab’s opening ceremony on July 12, it said. ISE Labs last year acquired a 5,942m2 facility in San
Local companies believe that nearly a third of all job opportunities will vanish in 10 years due to the rise of artificial intelligence (AI), according to a survey released by online job bank yes123 on Tuesday. In the survey of 1,016 companies on the labor market’s third quarter outlook, the job bank focused in part on AI’s impact on workers and asked companies what percentage of jobs they felt would be lost to AI’s round-the-clock productivity and high-speed computing prowess. Respondents felt on average that 29.2 percent of job opportunities would be lost to AI over the next 10 years, but there