Thursday, April 10, 2014

Another in the continuing run of ECFA successes

IMG_7903
Lost a toy on the roof...

ECFA struck again in March, delivering massive gains in exports to China. Hahaha, no, slowly declining trade with China. Of course! ECFA missed the golden age, which was during the Chen years, and now as China upgrades manufacturing technology, it is starting to render Taiwan producers either irrelevant or vulnerable.
Exports to Southeast Asia—Taiwan's second-largest overseas market after China and accounting for about a fifth of all exports—gained 5.7% after a 4.8% growth in February.

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However, China stood out as a weak spot. Last month, Taiwan's exports to China fell 3.7% from a year earlier, after a 11.3% increase in February. It was largely due to China's increasing reliance on locally-produced raw materials and components, Taiwan's government said Monday. Taiwanese TV panels, once a major export to China, are also losing out to the Chinese who have more advanced technology, the government added.
The real area of gain for Taiwan is South and Southeast Asia, and that's where the national effort should be focused. The long-term trend for China isn't good. And if Taiwan could fix its South China Sea policy, it might have an advantage over China. But the current administration....

As for the yammering punditocracy that argues for the inevitability of China's annexation of Taiwan via trade, perhaps the trend here might have an effect. But I'm not holding out any hope.....

Anyone who looks at the promises from ECFA will see the same ones as for the services pact....
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1 comment:

TaiwanJunkie said...

Problem with the US medical establishment is everyone is measured using the white scale. Normal weight for Asians should be BMI of 17.5 to 23, while whites would be from 19 to 25. They essentially used the white scale on her, which made her seem "very underweight" at BMI of 16.5. But per the Asian BMI she is just a little underweight.

Meanwhile, white doctors scratch their heads and can't figure out why all these Filipinos all have diabetes and fatty liver and cholesterol problems and gout when they are just "a little" overweight on the white BMI scale.