Following China’s announcement earlier yesterday that it had suspended imports of mangoes from Taiwan with immediate effect, the Ministry of Agriculture said it would take up the matter with the WTO’s Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (SPS) Committee.
China’s Taiwan Affairs Office spokesperson Zhu Fenglian (朱鳳蓮) said in Beijing that Chinese customs officers had detected citrus mealybugs in mangoes from Taiwan, which she said pose a “severe threat” to China’s agricultural and ecological security.
Chinese officials informed Taiwan of the decision via official channels set out in a cross-strait agreement governing quarantine inspections for agricultural products, Chinese state media reported.
Photo: Taipei Times
“The above-mentioned measures are normal biosafety precautions, scientific and reasonable, and comply with relevant mainland laws, regulations and standards,” the office said.
In Taipei, the agriculture ministry criticized the suspension as unwarranted and out of step with international trade standards. It said it had not received any such complaints from other export destinations.
The ministry “deeply regrets that China has repeatedly violated international practices and arbitrarily interrupted trade without scientific dialogue,” it said in a statement.
Deputy Minister of Agriculture Chen Junne-jih (陳駿季) said that China notified the ministry on June 15 and Aug. 3 that it had detected citrus mealybugs in shipments of mangoes from Taiwan.
The ministry then traced the shipments back to their source farms, and told Chinese officials on July 4 and on Thursday last week what steps were being taken to resolve the issue, he said.
The two cases are the only times Beijing has said citrus mealybugs had been found in the 5,689 mango shipments Taiwan has exported to China since 2018, Chen said.
The low detection rate and that China did not take steps to mitigate trade impacts — such as fumigating for citrus mealybugs — as recommended by the WTO, show that Beijing’s decision was “overly harsh” and out of line with international norms, Chen said, adding that the ministry would take the case to the WTO’s SPS Committee.
The suspension from China is unlikely to have major economic repercussions, he said.
Taiwan produced 174,000 tonnes of mangoes this year, of which only 4,000 tonnes, or 2.2 percent, were exported abroad, Chen said.
This year, China imported about 1,000 tonnes of Taiwan mangoes, while Japan and South Korea imported 700 and 600 tonnes respectively, he said.
Taiwan has complained for the past three years of Chinese import bans on agricultural and aquatic goods, including pineapples and grouper fish, saying they are part of a Chinese pressure campaign.
The latest announcement was made a few days after Vice President William Lai (賴清德) returned from a visit to Paraguay that included stopovers in the US.
The US government has signed defense cooperation agreements with Japan and the Philippines to boost the deterrence capabilities of countries in the first island chain, a report by the National Security Bureau (NSB) showed. The main countries on the first island chain include the two nations and Taiwan. The bureau is to present the report at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee tomorrow. The US military has deployed Typhon missile systems to Japan’s Yamaguchi Prefecture and Zambales province in the Philippines during their joint military exercises. It has also installed NMESIS anti-ship systems in Japan’s Okinawa
‘WIN-WIN’: The Philippines, and central and eastern European countries are important potential drone cooperation partners, Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung said Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) in an interview published yesterday confirmed that there are joint ventures between Taiwan and Poland in the drone industry. Lin made the remark in an exclusive interview with the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper). The government-backed Taiwan Excellence Drone International Business Opportunities Alliance and the Polish Chamber of Unmanned Systems on Wednesday last week signed a memorandum of understanding in Poland to develop a “non-China” supply chain for drones and work together on key technologies. Asked if Taiwan prioritized Poland among central and eastern European countries in drone collaboration, Lin
Renewed border fighting between Thailand and Cambodia showed no signs of abating yesterday, leaving hundreds of thousands of displaced people in both countries living in strained conditions as more flooded into temporary shelters. Reporters on the Thai side of the border heard sounds of outgoing, indirect fire yesterday. About 400,000 people have been evacuated from affected areas in Thailand and about 700 schools closed while fighting was ongoing in four border provinces, said Thai Rear Admiral Surasant Kongsiri, a spokesman for the military. Cambodia evacuated more than 127,000 villagers and closed hundreds of schools, the Thai Ministry of Defense said. Thailand’s military announced that
CABINET APPROVAL: People seeking assisted reproduction must be assessed to determine whether they would be adequate parents, the planned changes say Proposed amendments to the Assisted Reproduction Act (人工生殖法) advanced yesterday by the Executive Yuan would grant married lesbian couples and single women access to legal assisted reproductive services. The proposed revisions are “based on the fundamental principle of respecting women’s reproductive autonomy,” Cabinet spokesperson Michelle Lee (李慧芝) quoted Vice Premier Cheng Li-chiun (鄭麗君), who presided over a Cabinet meeting earlier yesterday, as saying at the briefing. The draft amendment would be submitted to the legislature for review. The Ministry of Health and Welfare, which proposed the amendments, said that experts on children’s rights, gender equality, law and medicine attended cross-disciplinary meetings, adding that
RSS