Taiwan's electrical and electronics products to meet green standards

This article was written by Bowun Jhu and published by the Taiwan Journal on August 12, 2005. It features a recent program launched by Taiwan's Ministry of Economic Affairs to help Taiwanese manufacturers meet the world's green standards.

Some quotations will show how important this article is:

"Two sets of environmental protection guidelines enacted by the European Union -- the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) Directive and the Restriction of Hazardous Substances in Electrical and Electronic Equipment (RoHS) Directive -- will take effect this month [August] and July next year [2006], respectively. Similar legislation is in the works in other countries, and all major makers of finished electrical and electronic products such as Sony, Hewlett-Packard, Dell and Motorola, have drawn up specifications for components supplied them by contract manufacturers worldwide."

"Taiwan's electrical and electronic equipment (EEE) industry plays a critical role in the supply chains of international information and communications companies and is the most important sector of the economy. Last year [2004], it had a total production value of around US$170 billion, or nearly 50 percent of the total industrial production. EEE exports were worth nearly US$87 billion, likewise accounting for about half of the value of the island's total exports, with about US$7.8 billion worth of goods going to the European Union."

"Given the importance of compliance with new environmental standards to the national economy, the MOEA is taking action to ensure that the local EEE industry is able to rise to the challenge of upgrading its operations to meet environmental-protection standards. Its Department of Industrial Technology (DIT) conducted a survey in early 2003 to understand problems in complying with the WEEE and RoHS Directives."

More useful information about the recent development of Taiwan's electrical and electronics industry is provided in this article.