Sunday, June 24, 2007

Taiwan Faces Tough Stepping


Taiwan firms face violence, snags in China-policymaker
By Ralph Jennings
REUTERS
3:37 a.m. June 21, 2007
HUALIEN, Taiwan – Almost 100 Taiwan investors have died and nearly 300 gone missing in China, while their firms are increasingly hit by sudden legal changes, the island's top China policymaker said on Thursday.
But many who gathered in this eastern Taiwan city for a government-sponsored meeting of China-based Taiwanese business leaders countered that the potential to make money in China outweighed any problems, especially for those with experience.
The 94 deaths and 339 disappearances in China since it opened up to Taiwanese investment were among 1,878 incidents reported by Taiwan investors, Chen Ming-tong, chairman of the Mainland Affairs Council, told Reuters.
About 1,160 incidents involved personal safety, he said.
“These statistics may just be the tip of an iceberg, and they show that strengthening the protection of Taiwan people and property is something we can't go easy on,” Chen said on the sidelines of a conference for 150 Taiwan investment leaders.
Local governments in China have also sprung a number of sudden legal changes on factory owners recently, such as costly new environmental regulations, he said.
Taiwan's independence-leaning Democratic Progressive Party, which controls the Mainland Affairs Council, discourages citizens from investing in China, which it sees as an archrival that competes for Taiwan investment dollars.
China and Taiwan split in 1949, when the Nationalist Party (KMT) fled to the island after a civil war against Mao Zedong's Communists. China has since regarded Taiwan as its territory rather than a separate country.
But in recent decades, about 750,000 Taiwan investors have opened factories, acquired farms and developed real estate in China to take advantage of its fast growth, cheap labor and large market. Some estimates say 1 million investors and family members now live in China.
Taiwan investors do not dispute the problems raised by their government, but say China is generally not hazardous for them.
“Whatever the problems are, it's still a good investment,” said Andrew Yeh, president-elect of the Taiwan business association in the factory town of Dongguan in southern China. “Only if I were to lose money would I not go there.”

No comments: