The US House of Representatives on Wednesday approved the first agreement under the US-Taiwan Initiative on 21st-Century Trade, sending it to the US Senate where it is expected to be ratified.
The initiative streamlines customs checks, looks to improve regulatory procedures and establishes anti-corruption measures.
The American Institute in Taiwan signed the agreement on June 1 with the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office in the US.
Photo courtesy of Z.Media
In Taipei, Minister Without Portfolio John Deng (鄧振中) said that expanding agricultural exports to the US would be a priority issue in negotiations of the second phase of the initiative.
Deng in an interview with media personality Frances Huang (黃光芹) said that environmental protection and labor issues would also be high on the agenda for negotiations in the second part of the trade initiative with the US.
The agreement covers 81 articles in five key areas and is a complete pact, Deng said, adding that it has legal basis and is a formal accord, unlike most of the deals previously signed with the US, which were in the form of memorandums.
The agreement covers the areas of customs administration and trade facilitation, good regulatory practices, services domestic regulation, anti-corruption, and small and medium-sized enterprises.
Taiwan and the US are to hold trade talks on the more complicated topics of environmental protection, labor and agricultural issues, Deng said.
On the issue of agriculture, the focus would be on Taiwan’s exports of agricultural products to the US, he said.
China used to be the largest market for Taiwanese agricultural exports.
However, Beijing has over the past few years banned the importation of several Taiwanese agricultural products, prompting the nation to shift exports to Singapore and Japan, he added.
The US is the biggest market for Taiwan’s agricultural goods and processed agricultural products, Deng said.
Regarding environmental protection, Taiwan would seek an environmental protection agreement with Washington, Deng said.
The government also hopes to create a favorable work environment for Taiwanese, he added.
The topics in the next phase of talks would be “a little more difficult” to discuss than the previous five items, Deng said.
The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday said it is fully aware of the situation following reports that the son of ousted Chinese politician Bo Xilai (薄熙來) has arrived in Taiwan and is to marry a Taiwanese. Local media reported that Bo Guagua (薄瓜瓜), son of the former member of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, is to marry the granddaughter of Luodong Poh-Ai Hospital founder Hsu Wen-cheng (許文政). The pair met when studying abroad and arranged to get married this year, with the wedding breakfast to be held at The One holiday resort in Hsinchu
The Taipei Zoo on Saturday said it would pursue legal action against a man who was filmed climbing over a railing to tease and feed spotted hyenas in their enclosure earlier that day. In videos uploaded to social media on Saturday, a man can be seen climbing over a protective railing and approaching a ledge above the zoo’s spotted hyena enclosure, before dropping unidentified objects down to two of the animals. The Taipei Zoo in a statement said the man’s actions were “extremely inappropriate and even illegal.” In addition to monitoring the hyenas’ health, the zoo would collect evidence provided by the public
A decision to describe a Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs statement on Singapore’s Taiwan policy as “erroneous” was made because the city-state has its own “one China policy” and has not followed Beijing’s “one China principle,” Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Tien Chung-kwang (田中光) said yesterday. It has been a longstanding practice for the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to speak on other countries’ behalf concerning Taiwan, Tien said. The latest example was a statement issued by the PRC after a meeting between Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財) and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) on the sidelines of the APEC summit
‘SIGN OF DANGER’: Beijing has never directly named Taiwanese leaders before, so China is saying that its actions are aimed at the DPP, a foundation official said National Security Bureau (NSB) Director-General Tsai Ming-yen (蔡明彥) yesterday accused Beijing of spreading propaganda, saying that Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) had singled out President William Lai (賴清德) in his meeting with US President Joe Biden when talking about those whose “true nature” seek Taiwanese independence. The Biden-Xi meeting took place on the sidelines of the APEC summit in Peru on Saturday. “If the US cares about maintaining peace across the Taiwan Strait, it is crucial that it sees clearly the true nature of Lai and the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in seeking Taiwanese independence, handles the Taiwan question with extra
RSS