(Central News Agency reporter Guo Jianshen, New Taipei Province, 8th) People’s Party presidential candidate Ko Wenzhe today proposed five major policies to promote industry, including formulating an economic security law, ensuring that key technologies remain in Taiwan, solving Taiwan’s five shortages, and allowing employees to share the essence of enterprises Taiwan should be brave and actively strive to join regional economic organizations such as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP).
Ko Wenzhe today held a press conference on “Resilient Taiwan, Creating Win-win” together with campaign director-general Huang Shanshan, People’s Party Secretary-General Zhou Taizhu, Taiwan Economic Research President Sun Chi-li, and Cultural University Adjunct Professor Du Zhenhua.
Ko Wenzhe said that Taiwanese companies have faced difficult challenges at home and abroad in recent years, including the U.S.-China trade war, the COVID-19 epidemic, the Russia-Ukraine war, etc., and even cross-strait economic and trade instability; although the semiconductor industry is Taiwan’s main force, it has been affected by the boom and bust of the global economy. Impact, the future industrial economy needs to have a hedging concept and avoid putting eggs in the same basket.
Ko Wenzhe said that in addition to the drastic changes in the external environment, Taiwan is also facing “five shortcomings” internally. This has been the case as early as when Lai Ching-te was the executive president. However, the Democratic Progressive Party lacked a long-term plan in power and would rather subsidize the import of eggs and pork and spend money. Coin is relatively fast.
Ko Wenzhe pointed out that Taiwan should move towards “resilient development,” which in colloquial terms means “resistant” and not affected by changes in the external environment.
Ko Wenzhe said that he advocated the formulation of an “Economic Security Law” and the establishment of an “Economic Security Council” under the National Security Council; the Executive Yuan designated a political affairs committee to operate, decide on the stable supply of important materials, subsidies, and loans, and protect cutting-edge important technologies to prevent The outflow of patents related to national economic security, such as TSMC’s processes of a few nanometers and above, can be moved out of Taiwan.
Talking about improving the five shortage problems, Ko Wenzhe said that for water shortages, we should strengthen the implementation of the “String of Pearls Project” to connect Taiwan’s water supply pipelines, focusing on rainwater interception, seawater desalination, and sewage reuse; for power shortages, nuclear power should be used as a transitional Use, and stop when renewable energy develops to the point where it can take over, and take into account power generation, transmission, storage, power saving, and smart grid updates.
Talking about the lack of land, Ko Wenzhe said that the government should improve the utilization of industrial land, take inventory of state-owned land, and plan affordable industrial zones; as for the shortage of workers and talents, it should open up foreign workers, be friendly to migrant workers, develop the “Strong Generation” movement, and encourage Elderly people are returning to the workforce and investing in higher education and an open environment to attract international talent.
Ke Wenzhe also said that currently Taiwan’s exports to mainland China account for 42.3%, and the 10 ASEAN countries account for 15.7%. The two regions alone account for 58%; currently, several regional economic organizations account for total trade with Taiwan, and the Cross-Strait Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA) accounts for 23%, the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) accounts for 26%, and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) accounts for 57%. He believes that Taiwan should be bolder and join RCEP.
Ke Wenzhe said that joining regional economic organizations can achieve tariff reductions. Taiwan’s biggest trade rival is South Korea. Taiwan’s global free trade agreement (FTA) coverage is only 9.7%, but South Korea’s global FTA coverage reaches 77.1%. He believes that RCEP is more important than CPTPP, and Taiwan must join in order to compete with South Korea on the same platform.
However, Ko Wenzhe also said that before it becomes difficult to join regional economic organizations, Taiwan should follow the “Swiss model”. In addition to striving to join regional economic organizations, Taiwan should also resume technical and vocational education and adopt a “two-front parallel” strategy. (Editor: Zhao Weilan) 1121108
