Tainan County has made progress selling mangoes to Japan in export volume after years of effort in seeking better fruit quality and effective promotional measures, Tainan County Commissioner Su Huan-chih (蘇煥智) said yesterday.
The agricultural county is known for many types of agricultural produce, with the Irwin mango being one of its specialty strains. The county is also Taiwan’s largest producer of mangoes.
Su said the county’s export of mangoes to Japan had increased from 100 tonnes in 2001 to 1,000 tonnes last year and that the volume this year had already surpassed 1,200 tonnes by the end of last month.
The improvement was the result of great efforts by local mango growers and the county government.
Su said the county practices a strict traceability system that requires that each exported mango carry a bar code representing its origin, which serves as a warranty from the farmers to win consumer confidence.
Moreover, to meet the requirements of countries like Japan that expect strict inspections on agricultural products, the county established vapor heat treatment facilities three years ago for insect sterilization of mangoes and tighter controls of pesticides used in contract orchards.
Only mangoes that pass strict inspections are competitive in the Japanese market. Quality rather than quantity is the key and Taiwan has no problem meeting the challenge, Su said.
The county has 540 hectares of contract orchards producing 6,000 tonnes for export annually, of which 30 percent can be shipped to Japan this year, Su said.
He said that each mango grower has to be careful about quality control because a single bad sample would affect the whole image the county has carefully built.
The county government established the Tainan Agriculture Trading Co four years ago to promote its farm produce domestically and globally.
Better quality control helps increase selling prices in Japan and the traceability system is expected to allow a mango to be sold at double its previous price, Su said.
ELECTRONICS BOOST: A predicted surge in exports would likely be driven by ICT products, exports of which have soared 84.7 percent from a year earlier, DBS said DBS Bank Ltd (星展銀行) yesterday raised its GDP growth forecast for Taiwan this year to 4 percent from 3 percent, citing robust demand for artificial intelligence (AI)-related exports and accelerated shipment activity, which are expected to offset potential headwinds from US tariffs. “Our GDP growth forecast for 2025 is revised up to 4 percent from 3 percent to reflect front-loaded exports and strong AI demand,” Singapore-based DBS senior economist Ma Tieying (馬鐵英) said in an online briefing. Taiwan’s second-quarter performance beat expectations, with GDP growth likely surpassing 5 percent, driven by a 34.1 percent year-on-year increase in exports, Ma said, citing government
‘REMARKABLE SHOWING’: The economy likely grew 5 percent in the first half of the year, although it would likely taper off significantly, TIER economist Gordon Sun said The Taiwan Institute of Economic Research (TIER) yesterday raised Taiwan’s GDP growth forecast for this year to 3.02 percent, citing robust export-driven expansion in the first half that is likely to give way to a notable slowdown later in the year as the front-loading of global shipments fades. The revised projection marks an upward adjustment of 0.11 percentage points from April’s estimate, driven by a surge in exports and corporate inventory buildup ahead of possible US tariff hikes, TIER economist Gordon Sun (孫明德) told a news conference in Taipei. Taiwan’s economy likely grew more than 5 percent in the first six months
SMART MANUFACTURING: The company aims to have its production close to the market end, but attracting investment is still a challenge, the firm’s president said Delta Electronics Inc (台達電) yesterday said its long-term global production plan would stay unchanged amid geopolitical and tariff policy uncertainties, citing its diversified global deployment. With operations in Taiwan, Thailand, China, India, Europe and the US, Delta follows a “produce at the market end” strategy and bases its production on customer demand, with major site plans unchanged, Delta president Simon Chang (張訓海) said on the sidelines of a company event yesterday. Thailand would remain Delta’s second headquarters, as stated in its first-quarter earnings conference, with its plant there adopting a full smart manufacturing system, Chang said. Thailand is the firm’s second-largest overseas
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) market value closed above US$1 trillion for the first time in Taipei last week, with a raised sales forecast driven by robust artificial intelligence (AI) demand. TSMC saw its Taiwanese shares climb to a record high on Friday, a near 50 percent rise from an April low. That has made it the first Asian stock worth more than US$1 trillion, since PetroChina Co (中國石油天然氣) briefly reached the milestone in 2007. As investors turned calm after their aggressive buying on Friday, amid optimism over the chipmaker’s business outlook, TSMC lost 0.43 percent to close at NT$1,150
RSS