The Executive Yuan yesterday approved a proposal to expand the scope of the Kaohsiung Offshore Transshipment Zone (
The proposal lifts a restriction imposing a minimum added value of 35 percent on the processing in Taiwan of products from China before such products may be exported to other countries.
"Now that the 35 percent restriction has been lifted, raw material will be allowed to enter Taiwan," said government spokesman Su Tzen-ping (
Su quoted Premier Chang Chun-hsiung (張俊雄) as saying that the proposal's passage signaled the government's determination both to implement the resolutions of the president's Economic Development Advisory Conference and to improve cross-strait relations.
The proposal also allows air-freight services and shipping services to be offered to companies using the transshipment zone.
It also, however, designates Kaohsiung harbor as the sole port in Taiwan to be authorized to maintain direct links with China, once such links become legal.
"It's because China has only opened up the ports of Xiamen and Fuzhou to Taiwan," said Fu Dong-cheng (
Fu, however, yesterday said that the council has neither put down a timetable for implementation of the proposal nor mapped out a plan to open up other ports in Taiwan to China.
But he also said that if the proposal is successfully implemented, the council has not ruled out the possibility of opening up other ports to China in the near future.
The premier yesterday said that he hoped China would respond by opening more ports to facilitate direct cross-strait links, lifting restrictions on cross-strait transportation for import and export commodities.
Chang also urged China to resume cross-strait negotiation with Taiwan as soon as possible.
Preferential tax areas, including neighboring processing zones in Kaohsiung's Chienchen (前鎮) and Nantzu (楠梓) districts, as well as all technology industrial parks, bonded factories and warehouses nationwide, will be integrated into the offshore transshipment zone.
Yesterday's proposal, prepared by the MAC, the Ministry of Transportation and Communications and the Ministry of Economic Affairs, is widely regarded as a prelude to the lifting of the government's "no haste, be patient (戒急用忍)" trade policy toward China, -- for which the Cabinet has set a deadline of year's end.
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