In today’s episode of Looking South, Eric Gau speaks with TAITRA Executive Vice President, Mr. Simon Wang
Eric Gau: Good morning everyone, I’m Eric Gau, and welcome back to another episode of Looking South here on ICRT. Today, we are once again chatting with TAITRA Executive Vice President, Mr. Simon Wang, this time about expanding New Southbound Policy target countries’ own markets. Mr. Wang, welcome back to the show.
Wang: Thank you Eric, good to see you again.
Eric Gau: Mr. Wang, what events or activities have been, or are being held, in New Southbound Policy target countries to help them expand their domestic markets?
Wang: Right, as a matter of fact, I think this is a kind of a systematic approach to help build up the bilateral trade relationship with our Southbound target countries. Firstly, you have to get to understand each other, so that market insight is very important to our companies. Digging into the special features of these markets, such as, they are full of the young generation. For those Asian countries, except Singapore with the median age of 34.3 years old and Thailand, 37.2 years old, and for the rest of the eight countries, all below 30 years old, so they are young countries. So market insight, this is the first thing we should work on. Second is that you got to have a group of people who are interested in exploring the market, so we organize those companies that are interested into a business club that are interested in developing the market of this area. For now, we have already recruited or attracted some 765 companies who showed their interest. The third step is to build a partnership. As a matter of fact, we laid out ten business models to engage with our partnership building. I think with this kind of systematic approach, we’re on track to enhance our bilateral trade.
Eric Gau: So where do you see the most potential for these efforts, and which country has been the most receptive and engaging with Taiwan on this front so far?
Wang: For those countries who are showing interest to do business with Taiwan, all of them are our friends. But, of course, I must admit that, with very limited resources, it’s almost impossible for us to put all of the resources into all of the countries. So, we analyze the target countries’ population and the domestic consumption, and we will probably put more resources on a couple of countries, such as Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, and India.
Eric Gau: Can you give us an example of a case that went particularly well, and how it has helped boost bilateral economic ties?
Wang: Firstly, to give some concrete results. From January to July, this year, our banks extended credit lines to Southeast Asia, for example, a positive growth of 23.6%. Our bilateral trade volume to Southeast Asia also grew by 15.8%, so these are all very positive developments. Also, another thing we’re trying to do… franchise stores, for example, in Taiwan, bubble tea is very popular. For the production value of bubble tea in Taiwan is about 50 billion NTD, so it’s a huge business. I think this area is an area where we could cooperate with the target countries. Because if we have some kind of franchise stores in, for example, in Indonesia, Vietnam and so forth, it would boost their employment, and open more stores and also expand domestic consumption. From our side, it’s also good to help our agricultural products and exports, and our technology transfer.
Eric Gau: So Mr. Wang, do you have any suggestions for how the future direction of these efforts can be adjusted to better help target countries?
Wang: I think talent is an area that we should do more, to have more people exchanges between two sides. TAITRA is now working on a program to organize strategic business management program, recruiting all of the CEOs of the small SMEs or the second generation who are going to take over the companies’ business. We try to cultivate or nurture three focuses. One is to help them have a visional view, so we include the global market, and of course, New Southbound Policy countries are one of our major focus. Second, we help them to form strategic thinking. We have invited foreign dignitaries to share how they think in terms of running business. Number three is the services. How they can utilize our services to develop their business with the New Southbound Policy countries. Of course there are a few of other areas such as, smart solutions, we have YouBike, that’s the sharing economic, electronic traffic control system, this kind of smart solutions, smart city, smart transportation, smart education, and so forth. Electronic commerce is also one of the areas that is very popular and rampant developing business in Southeast Asia.
Eric Gau: We’ve already touched on this, but what more can be done by the private sector of Taiwan to help New Southbound Policy target countries expand their markets?
Wang: I think, all in all, be well-prepared in mentality. When we want to work on a project or a long-term goal, we have to prepare ourselves with a precise concept. Not only to diversify our market, but we should also think of how to build up two-way traffic instead of one-way to export. That’s what I want our companies to learn, we should make friends first. I think if you want to get things done, normally you have to be there, so we ask our companies to join our delegation and to see for themselves. Particularly, if you can set up a marketing channel or a manufacture base there, we all encourage that. Also, private sector has to put resources, not just to see countries by themselves, that’s once for a year, for example, then you have to put resources, manpower, and marketing resources, these are all very important.
Eric Gau: We’ve been speaking with TAITRA Executive Vice President Mr. Simon Wang. Mr. Wang, thank you for joining up on the program once again.
Wang: Thank you for having me, thank you.
Eric Gau: And that’s it for this week’s Looking South, here on ICRT. I’m Eric Gau, thank you all for tuning in.