Taiwan Weekly is a newsletter released every week by Fair Winds Foundation, Association of Foreign Relations and Taipei Forum that provides coverage and perspectives into the latest developments in Taiwan.
New Semiconductor Ban Poses Risks for China, U.S. and TSMC
As a new U.S. semiconductor ban against China looms, American semiconductor companies have issued statements opposing such a ban.
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This Week in Taiwan 0723-0729
July 25: The Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) announced that it will spend NT$90 billion (about US$2.86 billion) to build an advanced packaging plant in the Tongluo Science Park, a branch of the Hsinchu Science Park. Sources indicate that this move is to cooperate with heavyweight customers including Advanced Micro Devices, NVIDIA, Apple, and Xilinx, to provide back-end advanced packaging for advanced logic chip manufacturing processes so that production capacity can be sustained to ensure advanced process chip production plans for the Kaohsiung 2nm plant and Longtan 1.4nm plant can be executed and the Tainan Science Park 3nm plant expanded.
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Lai's White House Dream：Hitting the Wall Even Before Meeting Trump
Vice President William Lai is scheduled to lead a delegation to visit Paraguay next month.
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TSMC Arizona Plant Delays: U.S. Should Invest in Taiwan's Security Rather Than Focus on Made in America
The Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company's (TSMC) construction delay of its Arizona wafer fab has presented a serious challenge to the United States since it sees the fab as a metric for its return to the local production of semiconductors.
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University Faculty-Student Relationships Should Not Be Regulated Haphazardly
Amidst the ongoing #MeToo movement, the Executive Yuan has unexpectedly introduced a draft amendment to the "Gender Equity Education Act."
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This Week in Taiwan 0716-0722
July 17: Vice President William Lai will serve as a special envoy to attend the presidential inauguration of Santiago Peña in Paraguay. Mr. Lai's expected transit stop in the United States has attracted scrutiny. Xie Feng, mainland China's ambassador to the United States, stated that Taiwan is the most important and sensitive issue in U.S.-China relations and that the presumptuous behavior of Taiwan independence activists should be stopped. The top priority is to resolutely block Mr. Lai's visit to the United States, Feng added.
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Semiconductor Industry Under the Shadow of Cross-Strait Conflict
The semiconductor industry has become Taiwan's "protective sacred mountain" over the last 20 years.
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Percent Exports Increase by 1.2％ Thanks to New Southbound Policy？
The Office of Trade Negotiations (OTN), Executive Yuan, recently pointed out that the proportion of exports to the New Southbound countries has increased by 1.2 percent in the past six years.
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"A Taiwan Emergency is a Japanese Emergency"：Will Okinawa Bear the Brunt？
People often refer to former Japanese Prime Minister Abe’s famous saying: "A Taiwan emergency is a Japanese emergency."
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This Week in Taiwan 0709-0715
July 10: For the first time in seven years, real wages in Taiwan have declined. According to statistics released by the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS), Executive Yuan, from January to May, the average recurring salary was NT$43,341 (about US$1,397), an annual increase of 2.46 percent, and the total salary increased by 1.61 percent. The annual growth rate of the consumer price index (CPI) was 2.44 percent during the same period. The DGBAS indicated that considering the price factor, real total salary is NT$58,348 (about US$1,881), an annual decrease of 0.81 percent. The figures show that salary growth cannot keep up with commodity prices.
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