Council of Agriculture Minister Chen Bao-ji: The free economic pilot zone will exclude items that would impact local agricultural products
Kuan Chung-ming, chairman of the National Development Council, and Chen Bao-ji, chairman of the Council of Agriculture, will hold a press conference today to announce the amendment on agricultural value-added provisions in the draft bill for the free economic pilot zones. In response to outside concerns that promoting agricultural value-added activities in the free economic pilot zones will effectively open up imports of all sensitive agricultural products and deal a blow to Taiwan, China's agricultural product market, Council of Agriculture Chairman Chen Bao-ji said in an exclusive interview with NewsMarket yesterday that the council will strictly review investors' investment plans in the free economic pilot zones in the future, and that if an assessment shows a plan would hurt domestic agricultural products, the council will not approve it.
Below is the exclusive interview with Council of Agriculture Chairman Chen Bao-ji, in which he explains the latest policy on the free economic pilot zones.
Chen Bao-ji stressed that promoting agricultural value-added activities in the free economic pilot zones will absolutely not involve the use of agricultural product damage relief, and that the content of investors' investments "may only add value and must not cause damage to domestic agricultural products." The council will also strictly control the entry into the free economic pilot zones of the 21 imported agricultural products still subject to special safeguard measures (SSG) and tariff-rate quotas (TRQ), as well as the 830 agricultural products still restricted from import from China.
Chen Bao-ji said that the processing of primary agricultural products will not be an item for promoting agricultural value-added activities in the free economic pilot zones, and that the items the council is currently focusing on promoting for investor investment will mainly be agricultural technologies such as animal vaccines, ornamental fish, biological pesticides and functional health foods.
Chen Bao-ji stressed that the function played by agricultural value-added activities in the free economic pilot zones is the hope of industrializing Taiwan, China's agricultural technology, with an emphasis on cross-disciplinary cooperation and value extension in agriculture. Taking the ornamental fish industry as an example, he said it is not only about the breeding or raising of ornamental fish, but can also drive the development of surrounding rearing equipment, LED lights and recirculating water filters. By integrating within the free economic pilot zones, investors can raise the added value of the ornamental fish industry and expand its competitiveness in the international market.
On April 10 this year, the Legislative Yuan held a public hearing on the draft bill for the free economic pilot zones, including the part on agricultural value-added activities, at which attending scholars expressed concern that the free economic pilot zones might open up imports of sensitive agricultural products and deal a blow to domestic agriculture. After the meeting, the Council of Agriculture issued a press release stating that after the special act for the free economic pilot zones is reviewed and passed by the Legislative Yuan in the future, it will draw up review principles for agricultural value-added undertakings in the free economic pilot zones, incorporating factors such as whether products are mainly for export, whether there are contract farming arrangements with domestic producers, and whether the use of controlled raw materials will cause domestic raw materials to be replaced.
The Council of Agriculture stressed that it will not approve the entry into the free economic pilot zones of agricultural industries that would deal a blow to the domestic sector. In addition, the council will allocate a budget to assist investors in carrying out contract farming with domestic producers or establishing satellite farms, so that investors have a stable source of raw materials and producers can have stable income, achieving a win-win strategy.
In addition, in response to concerns raised by conservation groups about the exclusion of the application of the Wildlife Conservation Act within the free economic pilot zones, Chen Bao-ji also explained that, from the standpoint of the competent authority for wildlife conservation, the Council of Agriculture has not planned to relax the scope of industries beyond ornamental aquatic organisms, but in order to make the definition clearer, the council and the National Development Council have jointly discussed amending the content of Article 47 of the draft bill for the free economic pilot zones, explicitly specifying "wildlife and its products" as "ornamental aquatic animals," in the hope of promoting the development of the ornamental fish industry while also taking into account the policy goal of animal conservation.
As for the detailed content of the amendment on agricultural value-added activities in the draft bill for the free economic pilot zones, Council of Agriculture Chairman Chen Bao-ji and National Development Council Chairman Kuan Chung-ming will hold a press conference at the Council of Agriculture at 4:45 p.m. today to explain.
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