The Taiwan Design Center, which helps local companies become cultural innovators, is to be become the Taiwan Design Research Agency, Vice Minister of Economic Affairs Lin Chuan-neng (林全能) said yesterday.
The upgrade, expected in the first half of next year, is to accompany a budget increase to NT$530 million (US$17.4 million) from NT$424 million, Lin told a news conference at the Executive Yuan in Taipei.
The agency is a collaboration between the Ministry of Economic Affairs and the Ministry of Culture, Lin said, adding that the partnership also generated the Taiwan Creative Content Agency, which promotes the creation of cultural content.
Photo: Screengrab from the Taiwan Design Center’s Facebook page
The design agency is to improve design from the industry side and promote it, he said.
The center gets 41 percent of its funding from the Ministry of Economic Affairs; 40 percent from other agencies, such as the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Transportation and Communications; and 19 percent from the private sector, Lin said.
The economic ministry seeks more participation from the private sector to increase private sector funding in the upgraded budget to 30 percent.
The World Economic Forum this year and last year named Taiwan No. 4 in innovation in its global competitiveness report, said Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌), who approved the center’s upgrade.
Taiwan could drive economic growth by integrating design into industry, technology and culture to create high-value-added products, Su said, adding that design is essential for innovation.
President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) in October promised to incorporate improved design into the robust manufacturing sector so that the “Made in Taiwan” brand could be upgraded to “Designed in Taiwan,” Su said.
The government would make fostering the nation’s design capabilities an administrative goal — one that could be more easily attained with the Taiwan Design Research Agency, Su said, adding that it would facilitate pooling of government resources.
The ministry told a weekly Cabinet meeting that it hopes that the nation can start pushing the Designed in Taiwan brand globally by 2030.
LOUD AND PROUD Taiwan might have taken a drubbing against Australia and Japan, but you might not know it from the enthusiasm and numbers of the fans Taiwan might not be expected to win the World Baseball Classic (WBC) but their fans are making their presence felt in Tokyo, with tens of thousands decked out in the team’s blue, blowing horns and singing songs. Taiwanese fans have packed out the Tokyo Dome for all three of their games so far and even threatened to drown out home team supporters when their team played Japan on Friday. They blew trumpets, chanted for their favorite players and had their own cheerleading squad who dance on a stage during the game. The team struggled to match that exuberance on the field, with
Whether Japan would help defend Taiwan in case of a cross-strait conflict would depend on the US and the extent to which Japan would be allowed to act under the US-Japan Security Treaty, former Japanese minister of defense Satoshi Morimoto said. As China has not given up on the idea of invading Taiwan by force, to what extent Japan could support US military action would hinge on Washington’s intention and its negotiation with Tokyo, Morimoto said in an interview with the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times) yesterday. There has to be sufficient mutual recognition of how Japan could provide
UPDATED TEST: The new rules aim to assess drivers’ awareness of risky behaviors and how they respond under certain circumstances, the Highway Bureau said Driver’s license applicants who fail to yield to pedestrians at intersections or to check blind spots, or omit pointing-and-calling procedures would fail the driving test, the Highway Bureau said yesterday. The change is set to be implemented at the end of the month, and is part of the bureau’s reform of the driving portion of the test, which has been criticized for failing to assess whether drivers can operate vehicles safely. Sedan drivers would be tested regarding yielding to pedestrians and turning their heads to check blind spots, while drivers of large vehicles would be tested on their familiarity with pointing-and-calling
A Taiwanese man apologized on Friday after saying in a social media post that he worked with Australia to provide scouting reports on Taiwan’s team, enabling Australia’s victory in this year’s World Baseball Classic (WBC), saying it was a joke and that he did not hold any position with foreign teams or Taiwan’s sports training center. Chen Po-hao (陳柏豪) drew the rage of many Taiwan baseball fans when he posted online on Thursday night, claiming credit for Australia’s 3-0 win over Taiwan in the opening game for Pool C, saying he worked as a physical therapist with the national team and
RSS