Taiwan’s top economic planner yesterday defended the government’s floating fuel pricing mechanism, saying that it was the best method to reflect high global oil prices and expressing his opposition to a renewed freeze on fuel prices.
Adjusting domestic fuel prices in accordance with changes in international crude oil prices is the best policy for the country, Council for Economic Planning and Development (CEPD) Chairman Chen Tain-jy (陳添枝) said in response to calls for the government not to raise fuel prices next month.
Chen said that he was opposed to reimposing a freeze on fuel prices and suggested instead that the government decide whether to adjust fuel prices on a monthly or weekly basis in an effort to prevent hoarding.
“Amid high oil prices, there is no better way than to adjust fuel prices based on the market mechanism,” Chen said.
A commodity price stabilization task force under the Executive Yuan decided at a meeting on Wednesday to request that the Ministry of Economic Affairs examine the pros and cons of a monthly versus a weekly review of gasoline prices at the pump, based on a floating pricing mechanism.
Executive Yuan Secretary-General Hsueh Hsiang-chuan (薛香川) said the government would take into account public opinion when mapping out policies related to raising fuel prices and the floating oil price mechanism.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy