Vice President Vincent Siew (蕭萬長) yesterday said that the government would continue to seek preferential treatment for local banks, negotiate on a cross-strait currency settlement mechanism and push for free-trade agreements with other countries in the wake of a trade pact that it signed with China on Tuesday.
In a speech on how Taiwan’s banking and financial sector should face the new cross-strait situation, Siew said that according to the spirit of the agreement, it should be implemented gradually rather than in one step.
FOLLOW UP
The Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA) will be followed up in three broad areas, he said.
First, the government will continue to ask China to give preferential treatment to Taiwanese banks, financial institutions, insurance firms and security companies that wish to operate in the Chinese market, he said.
The incentives should take the form of easier access to market, capital and locations, which would allow the institutions to establish footholds in China in the shortest possible time, he said.
CURRENCY
Second, negotiations on a cross-strait currency settlement mechanism will continue, in an effort to address the problems of high currency exchange transaction fees and high levels of risk in currency trading, Siew said.
Such a mechanism would help Taiwan to develop into a major offshore center for the Chinese yuan (renminbi) business and to upgrade its financial status in the Asia Pacific region, according to the vice president.
Third, Taiwan must step up its efforts to sign FTAs with other countries in order to obtain better opportunities for local businesses, he said.
In its bid to gain accession to the WTO in 2002, Taiwan promised, among other things, to open its financial market wider to allow some of its trading partners fair access, but this put local financial institutions at a competitive disadvantage, he said.
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