While European firms have seen improvements in the past year in 19 out of 20 problem areas of doing business in Taiwan, officials said yesterday that no progress had been made on opening up government infrastructure projects to foreign competitors.
"We're very concerned to ensure that European companies are able to get a fair and reasonable share in [infrastructure] development where they have expertise and technology that is beneficial to Taiwan," said John Pickles, director of the European Chamber of Commerce in Taipei (ECCT).
Pickles was speaking at the launch of the European chamber's 2003-2004 Position Papers of recommendations to the Taiwan government on how to improve the business environment for European investors here.
When it joined the World Trade Organization (WTO) in January last year, Taiwan pledged that within 12 months it would sign the Government Procurement Agreement (GPA). Ten months after the self-imposed deadline, the nation is still blocked from signing the GPA by Chinese objections to the name Taiwan uses to designate itself.
But even if Taiwan hasn't signed the GPA, business leaders said it should still live up to the spirit of the agreement.
"That is an area [where] we are still frustrated and we hope that Taiwan will open up as it is also in Taiwan's benefit," said ECCT chief executive officer Guy Wittich.
Benefits include European skills in areas like project management and technology, reduced costs for infrastructure projects because of a more competitive bidding process, and improved quality, Wittich said, adding that Taiwan could re-export the skills of its European partners to China where a lack of project management skills is costing Taiwanese firms lucrative contracts.
A Cabinet minister tried to assure European businessmen at a luncheon yesterday that Taiwan is living up to the spirit of the GPA.
"Unfortunately Taiwan's signing of the GPA from the provisions under the WTO has been held up due to external influences, but we will continue to follow the spirit of the GPA," said Minister without Portfolio Hu Sheng-cheng (
He said that a soon-to-be announced five-year NT$500 billion infrastructure development plan would be open to European bidders.
But the local manager of one German construction firm that has been in Taiwan for 16 years was skeptical.
"I notice that some of the projects in the NT$500 billion cornucopia have already started tendering and foreign contractors are basically excluded," Nick Carvel, of Bilfinger Berger AG, told the minister at yesterday's lunch. "Can you explain how this conforms to the spirit of the GPA?"
Hu denied that any projects were open for bidding yet.
Other issues of concern to the Europeans include the effective protection of intellectual property rights (IPR), the relaxation of rules that apply only to foreign firms, and the implementation of direct shipping links with China.
In all these areas "a lot of progress has been made," said Pickles, adding that there are many issues outstanding.
On IPR, Hu defended the government's record, saying that recent changes to the Copyright Law that make it easier to arrest and prosecute pirates had resulted in "substantive improvements in the protection of IPR." Hu cited a report by the US Department of Homeland Security that said the proportion of illegal DVDs, CDs and video CDs seized by US Customs that originated in Taiwan had fallen from 88 percent last year to just 6 percent in the first half of this year. The Taipei Times could not confirm this report as of press time yesterday.
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