■ Guatemala FTA imminent
Taiwan is expected to sign a free-trade agreement (FTA) with Guatemala this year, as the two sides have completed a second round of FTA negotiations in Guatemala City late last month, James Wu (吳新華), deputy director of Bureau of Foreign Trade, told the Taipei Times yesterday. "The progress is ahead of schedule," Wu said. During the second-round talks, the two countries have reached consensus on 90 percent of the agreement's articles and clauses, including tax breaks on agri-cultural and industrial goods and market access to the service sector, Wu said. The third round of FTA talks is scheduled to be held in Los Angeles starting June 6, he said. One major issue to be discussed in the next round is signing a cooperation agreement on shipping and air cargo between Taiwan and Guatemala to help boost the nation's logistics sector, Wu said. The delegation is confident that the remaining issues will be resolved in the third round of negotiations, making Guatemala Taiwan's second FTA partner after Panama, Wu said.
■ FSC to reduce interest gap
The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) yesterday agreed to narrow the gap between revolving credit rates and rates paid on savings accounts by amending the Banking Law (銀行法), the commission's Vice Chairman Lu Daung-yen (呂東英) said at a press conference. Local banks are under mounting pressure to reduce the gap amid allegations of overcharging consumers, with revolving credit rates starting as high as 20 percent. The savings rate now stands at around 2 percent at major banks, while the revolving credit rate applicable to both credit cards and cash-advance cards hovers at around 20 percent. People First Party Legislator Christine Liu (劉憶如) said the gap between revolving rates and savings rates is around 9 percent in the US, whereas the gap is about 18 percent in Taiwan.
■ EU wants textile talks
The EU said yesterday it wants to work with China's new international trade negotiator, Gao Hucheng (高虎城), to resolve a dispute over surging Chinese textile exports. "We want to work closely with Gao Hucheng, to reach a satisfactory solution," EU spokesman Amadeu Altafaj Tardio said. The EU on Friday launched an investigation into imports of Chinese textiles that could see the bloc re-imposing quotas lifted at the start of this year. That investigation, which is scheduled to last up to 60 days, includes talks with China.
■ Telecoms group visits US
A delegation led by Minister Without Portfolio Lin Ferng-ching (林逢慶) arrived in the US city of Dallas on Sunday to survey the telecommunications industry there. According to Lin, the "Ubiquitous Computing and Networking" delegation will explore opportunities for cooperation with the telecom sector in Dallas in the hopes that the sector can help in Taiwan's plan to establish a telecommunic-ations industrial park. After visiting Venture Research Inc, which specializes in radio frequency identification (RFID) solutions, on Sunday, the group was expected to visit Texas Instruments Inc, Nortel Networks Co, Electronic Data Systems Co and Dallas' telecommunication corridor over the next few days. The group is scheduled to head to Washington tomorrow before returning to Taipei on Sunday.
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
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