COA eyes fruit export market

The Council of Agriculture has developed an overseas promotion strategy to boost agricultural exports in a bid to reduce the negative impact on the country's agriculture sector following the nation's WTO accession, a council official said yesterday.

"We began planning a three-year international marketing scheme last year to promote our agricultural exports," Wang Ming-lai (王明來), the council's director general of international affairs, told reporters.

The council is going to rank and market three to five kinds of produce such as oolong tea as Taiwan's flagship agricultural products to target markets including Japan, the US, Hong Kong, South Korea and China.

The council will budget NT$150 million to establish overseas exhibition and sales centers in the target countries for receiving orders as well as cooperating with local retail channels to boost sales.

To achieve an increase of NT$6.5 billion in agricultural exports over the next three years, Wang said that the council had collaborated with state-run Taiwan Sugar Co (台糖) in setting up several specialized zones in southern Taiwan for various crops and fruit.

The council established a special zone for soybeans in Pingtung County in 2002, for instance, and is planning to set up two more zones for bananas and papayas in the same area as well.

The council will build infrastructure in these zones while farmers need to pay for rental of around NT$40,000 per hectare themselves, Wang said.

An agriculture professor said that the government needs to strengthen its overseas promotion efforts.

"Taiwan should cultivate more research and development talent on agriculture and marketing professionals to promote Taiwan's farm goods to the world," said Roger Wu (吳榮杰), professor of Agriculture Economics at National Taiwan University

"We can learn from the model that New Zealand uses to promote its kiwi fruit exports," Wu said. "We should utilize existing agricultural associations to integrate the small-scale peasant economy model and facilitate the expansion of Taiwanese agricultural exports to the world market."

Taiwan shipped out US$3.2 billion worth of farm goods last year and imported US$7.7 billion worth of goods from abroad, with a trade deficit amounting to US$4.5 billion last year, according to the council's statistics.

To improve its overseas marketing skills, Wang said yesterday that the council had set up an international marketing division, aimed at building up branding for Taiwan's produce.