The government said it will help Far Eastern Air Transport Corp (
Taiwan is in talks with other governments to let the smaller carriers fly international routes.
These flights might include destinations such as Bali, Vladivostok and South Korea's Jeju island, Minister of Transport and Communications Lin Ling-san (林陵三) said in an interview in Taipei.
"We're trying to expand routes for the airlines," Lin said. With the new routes, "their fleets won't go idle," he said.
Four of the nation's six airlines operate mostly domestic routes. They need to find new routes to compete with the two international carriers, China Airlines (
On the GRETAI securities market, Far Eastern Air shares rose almost 7 percent to close at a three-month high of NT$6.20. Shares of Transasia are not publicly traded.
Air travel on routes along the western coast is estimated to fall by 50 percent to 70 percent once the high-speed rail service commences, the transport ministry said.
Trains will travel at an average speed of 200kph, cutting travel time between Taipei and Kaohsiung by two-thirds to 90 minutes.
Air travel between Taipei and Kaohsiung takes about 50 min-utes, excluding time needed for security checks and other pre-flight measures.
The proposed new routes may not be enough to help the airlines stay competitive, because the flights will be flying to or from "second-tier" cities, compared with destinations like Tokyo and Hong Kong, said D.C. Wang, an analyst at Yuanta Core Pacific Capital Management Co (元大京華證券) in Taipei.
"They will be under pressure to consolidate after the high-speed rail begins operating," he said.
New air routes that are under discussion include a Taipei-Vladivostok service, a Kinmen-Singapore route and new flights from Taichung to unspecified Japanese cities, Lin said.
Mandarin Airlines (
Lin declined to disclose further details.
"It's inconvenient to talk about those involving country-to-country negotiations," he said.
China Airlines and EVA Airways, the nation's two biggest airlines, will be able to continue operating services between Taipei and the capitals of other countries, Lin said.
Any change in allocation of the routes will depend on the capacity of the airlines, he said.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
US CONSCULTANT: The US Department of Commerce’s Ursula Burns is a rarely seen US government consultant to be put forward to sit on the board, nominated as an independent director Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday nominated 10 candidates for its new board of directors, including Ursula Burns from the US Department of Commerce. It is rare that TSMC has nominated a US government consultant to sit on its board. Burns was nominated as one of seven independent directors. She is vice chair of the department’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness. Burns is to stand for election at TSMC’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 4 along with the rest of the candidates. TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) was not on the list after in December last