New Southbound Policy Office Director James Huang (黃志芳) has been named chairman of the nation’s main trade promotion body, the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA), the Executive Yuan said yesterday.
Executive Yuan spokesperson Hsu Kuo-yung (徐國勇) said Premier Lin Chuan (林全) approved Huang’s appointment on Friday, but he did not give further details.
Huang, a former minister of foreign affaris, is to succeed Francis Liang (梁國新), who took over as Taiwan’s representative to Singapore last month.
The 58-year-old Huang went into business in 2008 after stepping down as minister when a new administration came in.
“You probably don’t know that I once was in business overseas,” Huang said on a previous occasion, adding that he worked hard to learn Vietnamese and that he had many ideas on how to promote trade.
In related news, the Executive Yuan on Friday said that the nation’s exports under the “new southbound policy” totaled US$5.37 billion last month, up 20 percent from the same month in 2015.
Among them, exports to Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, Vietnam, Myanmar, Cambodia, and Laos totaled US$4.72 billion, up 22.9 percent from December 2015.
The “new southbound policy,” introduced by President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文), seeks to promote ties with the ASEAN nations, as well as India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Australia and New Zealand.
However, talent exchanges increased at a much slower pace. Students from those nations studying in Taiwan totaled 29,145 last year, up only 2.1 percent from the 28,550 in the 2015 academic year.
Among them, the number of students from ASEAN totaled 27,264, up 1.9 percent year-on-year. One noteworthy change was that the number of students from South Asia was up 12.4 percent year-on-year, totaling 1,443.
Government agencies are to allocate more resources this year to boost the number of South Asian or Southeast Asian students coming to Taiwan, the office said.
A small number of Taiwanese this year lost their citizenship rights after traveling in China and obtaining a one-time Chinese passport to cross the border into Russia, a source said today. The people signed up through Chinese travel agencies for tours of neighboring Russia with companies claiming they could obtain Russian visas and fast-track border clearance, the source said on condition of anonymity. The travelers were actually issued one-time-use Chinese passports, they said. Taiwanese are prohibited from holding a Chinese passport or household registration. If found to have a Chinese ID, they may lose their resident status under Article 9-1
Taiwanese were praised for their composure after a video filmed by Taiwanese tourists capturing the moment a magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck Japan’s Aomori Prefecture went viral on social media. The video shows a hotel room shaking violently amid Monday’s quake, with objects falling to the ground. Two Taiwanese began filming with their mobile phones, while two others held the sides of a TV to prevent it from falling. When the shaking stopped, the pair calmly took down the TV and laid it flat on a tatami mat, the video shows. The video also captured the group talking about the safety of their companions bathing
Starting on Jan. 1, YouBike riders must have insurance to use the service, and a six-month trial of NT$5 coupons under certain conditions would be implemented to balance bike shortages, a joint statement from transportation departments across Taipei, New Taipei City and Taoyuan announced yesterday. The rental bike system operator said that coupons would be offered to riders to rent bikes from full stations, for riders who take out an electric-assisted bike from a full station, and for riders who return a bike to an empty station. All riders with YouBike accounts are automatically eligible for the program, and each membership account
US climber Alex Honnold is to attempt to scale Taipei 101 without a rope and harness in a live Netflix special on Jan. 24, the streaming platform announced on Wednesday. Accounting for the time difference, the two-hour broadcast of Honnold’s climb, called Skyscraper Live, is to air on Jan. 23 in the US, Netflix said in a statement. Honnold, 40, was the first person ever to free solo climb the 900m El Capitan rock formation in Yosemite National Park — a feat that was recorded and later made into the 2018 documentary film Free Solo. Netflix previewed Skyscraper Live in October, after videos
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