Echoing the grievances of a number of businesses, lawmakers yesterday called on President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration to stop burdening small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) with high land leasing fees and property transaction charges.
After receiving complaints by several SMEs in industrial zones in central and southern Taiwan, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Lin Tai-hua (林岱樺) from Greater Kaohsiung accused the government of financially “squeezing” businesses.
“The treasury is depleted, so the Ma administration tries to extract money from workers. Is it now turning to extort money from small and medium enterprises?” Lin asked.
DPP Legislator Chen Ting-fei (陳亭妃) from Greater Tainan said that in the past decade, when faced with firms moving to China and Southeast Asian countries, the government had enacted an incentive measure for preferential land leasing rates in industrial zones in an effort to retain businesses.
‘These days, the government is swindling these companies, trying to extract more payment from them. The Industrial Development Bureau [IDB] has been oblivious to the many complaints from the suffering companies,” Chen said.
“Now with this situation and economy in stagnation ... we can see straight through Ma’s National Day address. He spoke about how industries must head toward higher value-added development. His words are nothing but lies and sloganeering,” she added.
The bureau recently sent out notices to more than 900 SMEs in 18 designated industrial parks, informing them that when they change their property lease or enter into a new land transaction, the businesses must now follow the current market valuation and not the price on the original contracts.
It involves the incentive proposition “Measure for Reinforcing the Adjustment of Preferential Rental Fees for Land in Industrial Zones,” also known as the “006688” measure. The proposition came into force on May 1, 2002.
The measure exempts companies from land lease fees during the first two years, seeks payment of 60 percent of full lease fees during the third and fourth years, 80 percent of full lease fees during the fifth and sixth years and the full payment of lease fees in the seventh year. The term limit for land leases is 20 years.
If the company applies to purchase the land before the lease period has expired, the guarantee deposit and lease fees already paid during the lease period may be subtracted from the original price of the contract. In this way the company is effectively exempted from lease fees during the lease period, according to information from the IDB.
DPP Legislator Lin Tai-hua (林岱樺) said that all the companies in the industrial zones had a common understanding that their signed original land contracts had been verified by the judiciary.
“But now the government’s executive branch is abusing their power to ‘play word games’ and ‘imposing their own definition,’ and so this is illegal and breaks binding contracts,” she said.
Lin accused the Ma administration of deceiving the public.
IDB chief secretary Chiu Chiu-hui (邱求慧) said the agency would find a fair and legal solution that is acceptable to all the companies involved.
Hong Kong-based American singer-songwriter Khalil Fong (方大同) has passed away at the age of 41, Fong’s record label confirmed yesterday. “With unwavering optimism in the face of a relentless illness for five years, Khalil Fong gently and gracefully bid farewell to this world on the morning of February 21, 2025, stepping into the next realm of existence to carry forward his purpose and dreams,” Fu Music wrote on the company’s official Facebook page. “The music and graphic novels he gifted to the world remain an eternal testament to his luminous spirit, a timeless treasure for generations to come,” it said. Although Fong’s
China’s military buildup in the southern portion of the first island chain poses a serious threat to Taiwan’s liquefied natural gas (LNG) supply, a defense analyst warned. Writing in a bulletin on the National Defense and Security Research’s Web site on Thursday, Huang Tsung-ting (黃宗鼎) said that China might choke off Taiwan’s energy supply without it. Beginning last year, China entrenched its position in the southern region of the first island chain, often with Russia’s active support, he said. In May of the same year, a Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) force consisting of a Type 054A destroyer, Type 055 destroyer,
Actor Darren Wang (王大陸) was questioned by prosecutors for allegedly orchestrating an attack on a taxi driver after he was allegedly driven on a longer than necessary route in a car he disliked. The questioning at the New Taipei City District Prosecutors’ Office was ongoing as of press time last night. Police have recommended charges of attempted murder. The legally embattled actor — known for his role in the coming-of-age film Our Times (我的少女時代) — is under a separate investigation for allegedly using fake medical documents to evade mandatory military service. According to local media reports, police said Wang earlier last year ordered a
Taiwan is planning to expand the use of artificial intelligence (AI)-based X-ray imaging to customs clearance points over the next four years to curb the smuggling of contraband, a Customs Administration official said. The official on condition of anonymity said the plan would cover meat products, e-cigarettes and heated tobacco products, large bundles of banknotes and certain agricultural produce. Taiwan began using AI image recognition systems in July 2021. This year, generative AI — a subset of AI which uses generative models to produce data — would be used to train AI models to produce realistic X-ray images of contraband, the official
RSS