Taiwan, troubled by an increasing brain drain and lack of effective headhunting, is preparing to launch a battle to attract and retain talent, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday.
Industrial Development Bureau Director-General Woody Duh (杜紫軍) said measures to stem the brain drain and recruit experienced, high-caliber individuals from abroad would be devised before the end of this year.
Taiwan will step away from the “preventive” approach and instead adopt proactive strategies to compete in the international market for high-quality human resources, Duh quoted Minister of Economic Affairs Shih Yen-hsiang (施顏祥) as saying.
Vice Minister of Economic Affairs Hwang Jung-chiou (黃重球) said China had stepped up its efforts to attract top high-technology talent from Taiwan, particularly in the LED sector.
The ministry has been receiving an increasing number of -complaints from high-tech companies, LED companies in particular, about high-caliber staff being lured to China by better compensation packages as China launches its new five-year development plan, Huang said.
The LED industry and green energy industrial development are among the seven major sectors included in China’s development plan.
Shih recently said the brain drain in Taiwan was occurring not just in the LED industry, but also in other high-tech sectors, such as information and telecommunications technology, and flat panel and optoelectronics manufacturing, with China being the main headhunter.
Previously, Singapore, Malaysia and South Korea were the main recruiters of Taiwanese talent, Duh said.
These countries not only drew high-tech talent, but also academics and experts from non--governmental organizations, he said.
Meanwhile, he said, Taiwan has lagged behind Singapore and South Korea in terms of its ability to attract talent from abroad, in part because of taxation issues.
Foreigners working in Taiwan could be taxed twice because Taiwan has few double taxation exemption agreements, he said.
Apart from the tax issue, he said, Taiwan needs to improve its overall work environment to recruit more foreign workers and attract investors from abroad.
The “battle-for-talent” project will begin with a series of workshops and discussions this month, Duh said.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
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