Taiwan’s exports last month clocked another 12 percent upturn from a year earlier to a record US$33 billion, as 5G smartphones and other new technology applications ramped up business for local component suppliers, the Ministry of Finance (MOF) said yesterday.
The growth momentum might gather further strength this month with increases from 19 percent to 23 percent, aided by three more working days in January this year compared with last year, the ministry said.
“The factors driving the growth look sustainable and the timing of the Lunar New Year holiday will also lend support,” Department of Statistics Director-General Beatrice Tsai (蔡美娜) told a news conference in Taipei.
Photo: Wu Chi-lun, Taipei Times
Demand for 5G communication, high-performance chips, as well as remote-working and education devices remain high, Tsai said, adding that iPhone 12 sales proved stronger than expected.
Taiwan is home to suppliers of chips, camera lenses, casing, touch panels, battery packs and assemblers to Apple Inc.
Meanwhile, strong demand for laptops, servers, and other information and communication technology (ICT) products showed no sign of receding as COVID-19 infections spike around the world, Tsai said.
Electronics exports soared 22.2 percent to US$12.76 billion, while shipments of ICT products gained 17.6 percent to US$4.77 billion, jointly contributing about 50 percent to overall exports, ministry data showed.
Optical products, mainly flat panels, posted the fastest advance of 27 percent year-on-year, Tsai said.
Demand for non-technology products also showed a healthy recovery — with shipments of plastic, chemical and base metal products gaining 2 percent to 15.5 percent, the ministry said, adding that mineral and textile products continued to buck the trend, slumping up to 52.4 percent year-on-year.
Import data showed a positive cyclical movement for the second straight month, even though the increase tapered to 0.9 percent, giving Taiwan a large trade surplus of US$5.76 billion that has more than doubled year-on-year, Tsai said.
Imports of capital equipment dropped 6.4 percent due to the timing of equipment arrivals, she said.
Exports rose 11.7 percent year-on-year to US$97.21 billion last quarter, stronger than the November forecast of 7.8 percent by the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics, Tsai said.
For the whole of last year, outbound shipments hit a record high of US$345.28 billion, representing a 4.9 percent increase from a year earlier, outperforming rivals around the world, Tsai said.
Imports grew a mild 3.2 percent to US$78.72 billion last quarter, allowing for a slim gain for the whole year of 0.3 percent to US$286.49 billion, she said.
When Lika Megreladze was a child, life in her native western Georgian region of Guria revolved around tea. Her mother worked for decades as a scientist at the Soviet Union’s Institute of Tea and Subtropical Crops in the village of Anaseuli, Georgia, perfecting cultivation methods for a Georgian tea industry that supplied the bulk of the vast communist state’s brews. “When I was a child, this was only my mum’s workplace. Only later I realized that it was something big,” she said. Now, the institute lies abandoned. Yellowed papers are strewn around its decaying corridors, and a statue of Soviet founder Vladimir Lenin
UNCERTAINTIES: Exports surged 34.1% and private investment grew 7.03% to outpace expectations in the first half, although US tariffs could stall momentum The Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) yesterday raised its GDP growth forecast to 3.05 percent this year on a robust first-half performance, but warned that US tariff threats and external uncertainty could stall momentum in the second half of the year. “The first half proved exceptionally strong, allowing room for optimism,” CIER president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) said. “But the growth momentum may slow moving forward due to US tariffs.” The tariff threat poses definite downside risks, although the scale of the impact remains unclear given the unpredictability of US President Donald Trump’s policies, Lien said. Despite the headwinds, Taiwan is likely
UNIFYING OPPOSITION: Numerous companies have registered complaints over the potential levies, bringing together rival automakers in voicing their reservations US President Donald Trump is readying plans for industry-specific tariffs to kick in alongside his country-by-country duties in two weeks, ramping up his push to reshape the US’ standing in the global trading system by penalizing purchases from abroad. Administration officials could release details of Trump’s planned 50 percent duty on copper in the days before they are set to take effect on Friday next week, a person familiar with the matter said. That is the same date Trump’s “reciprocal” levies on products from more than 100 nations are slated to begin. Trump on Tuesday said that he is likely to impose tariffs
HELPING HAND: Approving the sale of H20s could give China the edge it needs to capture market share and become the global standard, a US representative said The US President Donald Trump administration’s decision allowing Nvidia Corp to resume shipments of its H20 artificial intelligence (AI) chips to China risks bolstering Beijing’s military capabilities and expanding its capacity to compete with the US, the head of the US House Select Committee on Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party said. “The H20, which is a cost-effective and powerful AI inference chip, far surpasses China’s indigenous capability and would therefore provide a substantial increase to China’s AI development,” committee chairman John Moolenaar, a Michigan Republican, said on Friday in a letter to US Secretary of