Taipei and Beijing yesterday announced the formation of an ad hoc Cross-Strait Economic Cooperation Committee (CSECC) which will serve as the platform under which future trade deals under the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA) framework will be negotiated.
The committee is tasked with negotiating agreements on trade in commodities and services, investment protection and setting up a dispute-resolution procedure.
The ECFA stipulates that Taiwan and China must set up a CSECC once the trade pact takes effect and within six months initiate discussions on the four agreements.
The trade deal, signed in June, came into force on Sept. 12 and the “early harvest” list of items receiving preferential tariff treatment — which forms the backbone of the deal — took effect on Saturday.
In addition to the negotiations, the committee will also be responsible for supervising and assessing the implementation of the ECFA and settling disputes resulting from it.
Lee Li-jane (李麗珍), director of the Mainland Affairs Council’s (MAC) department of economic affairs, said the committee would comprise at least six working groups to deal with traded goods and services, investment protection, dispute settlement, rules on certificates of place of origin, as well as intellectual property rights.
Should the need arise, more working groups dealing with other issues, such as cooperation on customs or electronic commerce, could be added, Lee said.
The Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait (ARATS) and the Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) announced separately that ARATS Vice Chairman Zheng Lizhong (鄭立中) and SEF Vice Chairman Kao Koong-lian (高孔廉) would serve as the conveners.
The SEF said Vice Minister of Economic Affairs Francis Liang (梁國新) would head Taiwan’s 13-member team. All members will be officials from government agencies, including the Ministry of Economic Affairs, the Ministry of Finance, the Financial Supervisory Commission, the Council for Economic Planning and Development, the SEF and the MAC, it said.
In a statement, ARATS said Chinese Vice Minister of Commerce Jiang Zengwei (姜增偉) would head the Chinese team. Although the names of Beijing’s appointees were not unveiled, it said the experts came from the Chinese Ministry of Commerce, the Ministry of Finance, the General Administration of Customs, the Taiwan Affairs Office, the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine.
Both sides agreed that more delegates could be added to the committee if necessary.
Lee said the committee planned to meet twice a year, with both sides taking turns to host the meeting.
Responding to the announcement, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Lee Ching-hua (李慶華), who sits on the legislature’s Economics Committee, said he was worried about how high the panel ranked in the government’s hierarchy and whether it would have enough authority to coordinate between the different branches of the government.
The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) said the CSECC should fall under the jurisdiction of the legislature, adding that cross-strait agreements were a sensitive issue and needed to be closely supervised by the public.
“The operations of the CSECC, which include clarifying cross-strait trade regulations and reporting on key trading information, are an important issue. As a result, the committee should not fall outside of the legislature’s supervision,” DPP spokesperson Cheng Wen-tsang (鄭文燦) said.
The DPP believes the committee should also be more open and transparent, adding that otherwise it would be liable to be criticized by the public.
Speaking about the DPP’s apprehensions, MAC Deputy Minister Liu Te-shun (劉德勳) said all cross-strait agreements that require signatures would be handled by the SEF and ARATS before proceeding to the legislature for approval.
The committee is not an “alien,” as some charged, or “a monster” that will denigrate Taiwan’s sovereignty, Liang said, but rather a “necessary mechanism” that is commonly seen in trade deals between countries.
Regarding the DPP’s proposal for the creation of a review committee, Liu said the council would respect the legislature’s decision on the matter, but such a body was unnecessary, as the legislature already has a review mechanism.
Liang said the committee did not rule out publicizing progress on negotiations when the time was appropriate. However, he said that any revelations about ongoing negotiations must take into account the best interests of the industries involved and country as a whole.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY VINCENT Y. CHAO AND FLORA WANG
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