New Economic Development Commission convenes inaugural meeting

Premier Cho Jung-tai on Thursday chaired the inaugural meeting of the Executive Yuan's Economic Development Commission. At a post-meeting press conference, the premier said the meeting yielded several concrete resolutions. Firstly, regarding its future schedule, the Commission will convene at least once every quarter, and will convene its first advisory meeting this August. The initial discussion results of Thursday's meeting will be submitted to the advisory meeting's panel of experts and scholars for further exchange and discussion, in hopes of gaining more valuable insights to guide which tasks and topics the Commission should focus upon in the future.

The premier also said that a plan to invest trillions into national development was proposed during Thursday's meeting. The plan's initial objective is to attract NT$3 to 4 trillion (US$92 to 122.7 billion) of domestic and foreign capital to invest in major infrastructure and important industries in Taiwan. In the future, through cooperation across ministries and agencies, the Executive Yuan will establish a one-stop service window to facilitate regulatory compliance related to the plan. The Executive Yuan will also establish a related platform to accelerate the implementation of a program for large-scale investment in Taiwan.

In addition, the premier said the government plans to transform Taiwan into Asia's center for asset management while retaining unique Taiwanese features, thereby enhancing the flexibility of Taiwan's capital flow and capital deployment, bringing about greater economic well-being for more people, and realizing the goals of inclusive finance and green finance.

Finally, a program to boost the nation's talent competitiveness was also proposed during the meeting. The program will promote the strategy of nurturing, retaining and recruiting talent according to the highest standards, and integrate the capabilities of ministries and agencies to cultivate the 200,000 artificial intelligence talents that the nation needs, while simultaneously bringing in 120,000 foreign talents to strengthen Taiwan's competitiveness.

Premier Cho said in this new era of information abundance and rapid technological advancement, the convening of the Economic Development Commission is a necessary new action. Both at the individual level and the industry level, many in Taiwan are concerned about the issues due to be discussed by the Commission, and the government pledges it will address these concerns with concrete methods and in a clear-cut manner.

By fusing the strengths of the public and private sectors with the power of the people and cross-disciplinary collaboration to solicit a broad range of opinions and engage in thorough discussion, the government will be in a position to take innovative actions in order to achieve its objectives, the premier said.