The Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) yesterday said that it would release its producer price index (PPI) on a monthly basis starting next year to better capture movements in selling prices from domestic production and to stay with the global trend.
The agency said that it has finished compiling its latest PPI data and plans to present them to the quarterly review committee next month to update the nation’s GDP growth and per capita income.
DGBAS has relied on the wholesale price index (WPI) to track the cost of production for the past 40 years, while most economies worldwide favor PPI, widely considered an objective tool for adjusting prices in long-term purchasing agreements, it said.
Photo: CNA
Because prices fluctuate, long-term deals are difficult with only a single, fixed price for goods or supplies, so the purchasing business and the supplier typically include a clause in the contract that adjusts the cost by external indicators, such as PPI, it said.
It is time for the DGBAS to adjust and link up with the world after decades of guiding its inflation observations using the consumer price index and cost of production with WPI, DGBAS officials told Chinese-language media.
WPI reflects purchase costs and factory-gate prices, making its boundary less clear-cut in measuring production costs and GDP, the officials said.
PPI would limit its survey to domestic producers — exporters and importers — and omit trading companies and re-exporters, as trading firms are not manufacturers and re-exporters make a profit by processing foreign goods, they said.
DGBAS has long sought to compile PPI and replace WPI, but hesitated due to concerns over rules governing asset revaluations of profit-making organizations and WPI links to basic labor wages, the agency said.
As a result, WPI would continue with PPI, unless people mix them up, it said.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last