Farmers urged to support government stance on fruit trade

This article was from the Central News Agency and published by the Macroview Weekly on August 3, 2005.

China recently announced that from August 1, 2005, it would abolish tariffs on 15 varieties of Taiwan fruit. However, the government in Taiwan is still conducting negotiations on other technical details regarding future fruit trade with China. These details include produce origin certification, fast-track customs clearance and quarantine.

The government points out that negotiations on these technical details are crucial, in order to ensure that future arrangements about Taiwan fruit exports would be reasonable and beneficial to local farmers, not just brokers or middlemen.

In 2004, Taiwan exported US$340,000 worth of fruit to China.

In general, in recent years the government has been helping local farmers as they endeavor to meet quarantine standards in other countries. In 2004, Taiwan fruit exports amounted to US$3.5 billion. It was a 10 percent rise from the previous year.