Earlier this year, Taiwan allowed chartered flights to China for the Lunar New Year celebration. And, in May, the government said it was considering permitting direct charter cargo flights to China to alleviate the fallout from SARS.
Moreover, there are economic imperatives for direct links between the two sides, as savings in transportation costs will result in an increase of Taiwan's GDP by 2 percent to 3 percent after the implementation of direct links for three to five years, Smith said in the report.
Against this backdrop, "we believe that it is inevitable that Taiwan's policymakers will be forced to look at direct links not as a panacea for the economy, but at the very least as a much-needed shot in the arm," the analyst said.
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