The media have reported that in February of this year Shenzhen Harbor's container traffic surpassed that of Kaohsiung Harbor, and Kaohsiung's container traffic dropped to sixth place in the world. Although Shanghai and Shenzhen depend on China having become the world's manufacturing center, the added value of incoming and outgoing containers is not great. They earn only slim profits from shipping fees.
Recently, legislation establishing free trade ports has been passed in the spirit of taking over transit port services now handled by Hong Kong and Singapore. By complementing these services with Taiwan's manufacturing expertise and opening up port regions for processing work, manufacturers will be enticed to set up shop and create a source for goods. This could create added value for import-export container traffic, and in a way that makes the most of Taiwan's comparative advantages.
One question remains, however. After Kaohsiung harbor becomes a free trade port, will it really be restored to its past glory?
Taiwan's industries have advantages of manufacturing know-how and marketing skill. The government has also dedicated itself to developing the hardware and software infrastructure for port facilities. Nevertheless, because goods and people still can't freely and rapidly flow between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait, free-trade ports fall short of their potential.
Because of the curse of "one China," we are always one step short of setting up direct links across the Strait. And due to the lack of direct links, Taiwan is unable to become the portal by which firms from all over the world enter China. In fact, a situation has been created in which more foreign businesses leave Taiwan every year.
We can understand that our national leaders reject the "one China" principle out of a desire to protect Taiwan's sovereignty. We can see the wavering and hesitancy of government authorities caught between economic inter-ests and national sovereignty. But political biases are swallowing up Taiwan's room for survival.
Perhaps turning Kaohsiung harbor into a free-trade port is a starting point for transforming economic and trade relations across the Strait, but it will be necessary to cleverly resolve the deadlock over direct links. On the basis of Kaohsiung's status as a special municipality, the city should be allowed to become a special zone for interaction between Taiwan and China.
Disputes over sovereignty that the central government is unable to avoid should be sidestepped, and direct city-to-city links should be opened with cities in China using a local-government-to-local-government model. In this way, the fear of full-scale direct links might be mitigated. Moreover, a starting point would be provided for normalization of cross-strait economic and trade relations, and a channel for Taiwan to take advantage of the China market would be opened up.
Taiwan's position on the international stage is a uniquely difficult one. Thus we will require a particularly flexible strategy to break through China's blockade. Turning Kaohsiung harbor into a free-trade port won't suffice to turn the situation around. Raising Kaohsiung's status to that of a special zone in order to break free of the shackles of "one China" and using the city as a site to test direct links might be a way to simultaneously look after the nation's sovereignty and economic interests.
Free-trade ports without direct links are like an eagle with clipped wings. No matter how it might flap its wings, it can't soar into the sky. Let's see how the authorities break free of constraints by letting Kaohsiung harbor lead Taiwan back to prosperity.
Cheng Chieh-yi is a researcher at the New Taiwan Foundation.
Translated by Ethan Harkness
Taiwan stands at the epicenter of a seismic shift that will determine the Indo-Pacific’s future security architecture. Whether deterrence prevails or collapses will reverberate far beyond the Taiwan Strait, fundamentally reshaping global power dynamics. The stakes could not be higher. Today, Taipei confronts an unprecedented convergence of threats from an increasingly muscular China that has intensified its multidimensional pressure campaign. Beijing’s strategy is comprehensive: military intimidation, diplomatic isolation, economic coercion, and sophisticated influence operations designed to fracture Taiwan’s democratic society from within. This challenge is magnified by Taiwan’s internal political divisions, which extend to fundamental questions about the island’s identity and future
The narrative surrounding Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s attendance at last week’s Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit — where he held hands with Russian President Vladimir Putin and chatted amiably with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) — was widely framed as a signal of Modi distancing himself from the US and edging closer to regional autocrats. It was depicted as Modi reacting to the levying of high US tariffs, burying the hatchet over border disputes with China, and heralding less engagement with the Quadrilateral Security dialogue (Quad) composed of the US, India, Japan and Australia. With Modi in China for the
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) has postponed its chairperson candidate registration for two weeks, and so far, nine people have announced their intention to run for chairperson, the most on record, with more expected to announce their campaign in the final days. On the evening of Aug. 23, shortly after seven KMT lawmakers survived recall votes, KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) announced he would step down and urged Taichung Mayor Lu Shiow-yen (盧秀燕) to step in and lead the party back to power. Lu immediately ruled herself out the following day, leaving the subject in question. In the days that followed, several
The Jamestown Foundation last week published an article exposing Beijing’s oil rigs and other potential dual-use platforms in waters near Pratas Island (Dongsha Island, 東沙島). China’s activities there resembled what they did in the East China Sea, inside the exclusive economic zones of Japan and South Korea, as well as with other South China Sea claimants. However, the most surprising element of the report was that the authors’ government contacts and Jamestown’s own evinced little awareness of China’s activities. That Beijing’s testing of Taiwanese (and its allies) situational awareness seemingly went unnoticed strongly suggests the need for more intelligence. Taiwan’s naval
RSS