The number of employment and entrepreneurship bases authorized by China’s Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) has dropped by half and are unable to provide support to young Taiwanese, a government investigation has found.
The TAO in 2015 began establishing such bases to help young Taiwanese and Chinese seek employment or start their own businesses, the government investigation said.
The program is part of Beijing’s “united front” tactics targeting young Taiwanese, promising to provide thousands of employment and internship opportunities.
Photo: AFP
However, only 39 of the 78 bases are still in operation, organizing four events in the past three years, the investigation found.
The four events included a summit and an exchange event in Nanjing in 2020, as well as a training program and an entrepreneurship competition held last year in Nanjing and Shanghai respectively, it found.
Some bases are moving toward marketization, a Taiwanese who participated in these events said, and the opportunities for Taiwanese to start a business in China have been greatly reduced in recent years, the investigation said.
The bases in many provinces are unable to continue operating, resulting in many Taiwanese who tried to start a business in China failing or receiving no assistance, an official said on condition of anonymity.
The economic and political risks of starting businesses or getting jobs in China have also increased, the person said.
Due to China’s ailing economy, local young people are struggling to find jobs, he said, adding that unemployment is worse than the official data show.
Many young people are unwilling or afraid to spend money, choosing to stay at their family homes and relying on their parents, which has caused the economy to stagnate further and exacerbating social problems, the person said.
As foreign investors and Taiwanese businesspeople are planning to leave China under these circumstances, unemployment is expected to worsen, the person added.
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