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In particular, US companies attending this event urged the US government to return to the Pacific Rim Economic Partnership Agreement (TPP) early or to conclude a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between the US and Taiwan.
On the 6th (local time), according to the Nippon Geizai newspaper, on that day, Matt Murray, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Trade Policy Negotiation, and Taiwanese Minister of Economy, Wang Mei-Hwa, held a high-level economic meeting. Qualcomm and business organizations attended the meeting, which was held by video due to Corona 19, and more than 100 people, including high-ranking executives such as TSMC and MediaTek, the world’s largest foundry companies, were present in Taiwan.
The U.S. government, which has had high-level economic dialogue with China so far, established an economic dialogue with Taiwan under the former administration of Donald Trump to check China, and the first meeting was held in Washington, DC last November. At the time, discussions were made on seven items, including semiconductors and fifth-generation (5G) communication standards, and cooperation to escape the US economy’s dependence on China and to ensure Taiwan’s new safety. The subject of the first conversation in the Biden administration was semiconductors.
In this event, the two countries agreed to cooperate with each other in rebuilding their supply chain under the theme of semiconductors, which are currently experiencing a severe supply shortage around the world. It is reported that US companies and industry groups participating in this event demanded that the US government should return to the TPP early or conclude an FTA between the US and Taiwan for this purpose. It was also suggested that Taiwan should be able to join the TPP through this.
Minister Wang Mei-Hwa, who met with reporters right after the economic dialogue with the United States, said, “The situation is still difficult (for cooperation with the United States), but from the US government and US auto industry organizations. “Thank you very much,” he said. This suggests cooperation from Taiwan, but Minister Wang avoided commenting on specific details of cooperation. In the dialogue that day, TSMC executives were said to have remarked that “the United States and Taiwan (in many fields such as semiconductors) are interdependent.”
Currently, in the US, Ford Motors and General Motors (GM) are simultaneously shutting down their production lines due to a shortage of automotive semiconductors or are starting to cut production. Accordingly, the US government, like Germany and Japan, is asking the Taiwanese government to increase the supply of semiconductors for vehicles.
In addition, the U.S. and Taiwan recognized the need to urgently reorganize a safe supply chain (supply chain) that does not cause shortages of semiconductors in the future, while strengthening economic partnerships by cooperating in research and development in the semiconductor field, human resource development, and intellectual property protection. Together.