Continuous momentum between Taiwan and the EU is essential for negotiations over a bilateral investment agreement to proceed, Madeleine Majorenko, head of the European Economic and Trade Office in Taiwan, said yesterday.
The EU has entered a preparatory phase for such talks with Taiwan, she said, adding that during the period, the two sides are to express their ambitions and commitments to cooperation.
While there is no timetable for starting formal negotiations, the more comprehensive the preparatory phase is, the smoother the follow-up trade negotiations would be, she said.
Taiwan aims to strike a bilateral investment agreement and an economic cooperation pact with the EU.
In October last year, the European Commission said it is to explore starting negotiations on investment with Taiwan as part of a trade globalization plan.
Majorenko also congratulated president-elect Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), saying that the way the elections were held was “impressive.”
The elections were “an expression of democratic values and democratic maturity,” she said.
Regarding President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) visit to Itu Aba Island (Taiping Island, 太平島) in the South China Sea, Majorenko urged all parties involved in the territorial dispute surrounding the island to act responsibly to maintain stability in the region and not to “rock the boat.”
“As I said, everyone should keep a calm head. That is very important,” Majorenko said.
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],”
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
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