Taiwan and China resumed talks on a trade in goods agreement yesterday after a nearly 11-month hiatus. However, the government has kept the talks so secret that almost all that is known is that the three-day meeting is being held somewhere in Taiwan.
However, late last night Storm Media Group (風傳媒) reported the meeting is being held at the Evergreen Resort Hotel in Yilan County’s Jiaosi Township (礁溪).
The delay in ratifying the cross-strait service trade agreement signed in June last year — because of widespread public protests and opposition parties’ delay tactics in the legislature — meant that no negotiations had been held since the last round of bilateral trade talks wrapped up in October, hampering the government’s efforts to make progress in inking a trade in goods agreement with Beijing.
Photo: CNA
Taiwan’s negotiating team for the ninth round of talks on a goods trade pact is being led by Bureau of Foreign Trade Director-General Jenni Yang (楊珍妮), while Beijing’s team is led by Chen Xing (陳星), head of the Chinese Ministry of Commerce’s Department of Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau Affairs.
This round of talks are expected to first focus on technical issues, such as “which industrial items would be subject to tariff reductions, how tariff cuts would be introduced and preconditions for such cuts,” Minister of Economic Affairs Woody Duh (杜紫軍) said yesterday ahead of the start of the talks.
“It will take a very long time for the trade in goods agreement talks to hammer out some concrete results,” cable TV network UBN quoted Duh as saying after presiding over a handover ceremony for the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) in Taipei, where Cabinet adviser Francis Liang (梁國新) replaced Wang Chih-kang (王志剛) as TAITRA chairman.
Photo: CNA
“We hope [the two sides can] reach an initial consensus on certain technical issues in this meeting. We will move toward the goods trade agreement only after the Legislative Yuan resolves issues related to legislation on a mechanism for monitoring cross-strait agreements and the ratification of the service trade pact,” Duh said.
Local media reported that Taiwan plans to seek tariff reductions in the flat-panel display, machine tool, petrochemical and automobile sectors.
However, Duh said that tariff reductions to be discussed would also include between 6,000 and 7,000 items about which Taiwan’s small and medium-sized businesses care most.
The minister said the Taiwanese team would work hard to keep the opening of the local agricultural market to China at current levels. He did not elaborate.
It is not clear whether the ministry will make the content of this latest round of talks public, and if it did, when it might do so.
The secrecy surrounding the talks led representatives of several groups to protest outside the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) in Taipei. They said the proposed trade in goods pact would sacrifice the interests of Taiwanese and benefit only a few large corporations.
More than 30 protesters — including Democratic Front Against the Cross-Strait Trade in Services Agreement spokesperson Lai Chung-chiang and Sunflower movement leader Chen Wei-ting (陳為廷) — held up placards and chanted slogans, including “stop the trade in goods talks” and “MOEA, don’t play hide-and-seek.”
Industrial Development Bureau Deputy Director-General Lien Ching-chang (連錦漳) said the Taiwanese negotiators would do their best to negotiate the best deals for the country’s industries, and will “completely” protect and guard its sensitive industries.
Additional reporting by CNA
Taiwan is projected to lose a working-age population of about 6.67 million people in two waves of retirement in the coming years, as the nation confronts accelerating demographic decline and a shortage of younger workers to take their place, the Ministry of the Interior said. Taiwan experienced its largest baby boom between 1958 and 1966, when the population grew by 3.78 million, followed by a second surge of 2.89 million between 1976 and 1982, ministry data showed. In 2023, the first of those baby boom generations — those born in the late 1950s and early 1960s — began to enter retirement, triggering
One of two tropical depressions that formed off Taiwan yesterday morning could turn into a moderate typhoon by the weekend, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Tropical Depression No. 21 formed at 8am about 1,850km off the southeast coast, CWA forecaster Lee Meng-hsuan (李孟軒) said. The weather system is expected to move northwest as it builds momentum, possibly intensifying this weekend into a typhoon, which would be called Mitag, Lee said. The radius of the storm is expected to reach almost 200km, she said. It is forecast to approach the southeast of Taiwan on Monday next week and pass through the Bashi Channel
NO CHANGE: The TRA makes clear that the US does not consider the status of Taiwan to have been determined by WWII-era documents, a former AIT deputy director said The American Institute in Taiwan’s (AIT) comments that World War-II era documents do not determine Taiwan’s political status accurately conveyed the US’ stance, the US Department of State said. An AIT spokesperson on Saturday said that a Chinese official mischaracterized World War II-era documents as stating that Taiwan was ceded to the China. The remarks from the US’ de facto embassy in Taiwan drew criticism from the Ma Ying-jeou Foundation, whose director said the comments put Taiwan in danger. The Chinese-language United Daily News yesterday reported that a US State Department spokesperson confirmed the AIT’s position. They added that the US would continue to
The number of Chinese spouses applying for dependent residency as well as long-term residency in Taiwan has decreased, the Mainland Affairs Council said yesterday, adding that the reduction of Chinese spouses staying or living in Taiwan is only one facet reflecting the general decrease in the number of people willing to get married in Taiwan. The number of Chinese spouses applying for dependent residency last year was 7,123, down by 2,931, or 29.15 percent, from the previous year. The same census showed that the number of Chinese spouses applying for long-term residency and receiving approval last year stood at 2,973, down 1,520,
RSS