Focus Taiwan
Date: 2019/10/25
By: Chung Jung-feng and Frances Huang

Taipei, Oct. 25 (CNA) The production value of Taiwan's machinery industry will grow about 4 percent

in 2020, boosted by rising demand from overseas Taiwanese manufacturers returning home to avoid tariffs on Chinese-made goods, a government sponsored institute said Friday.

The Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) estimated at an industrial development forum that the value of the output of Taiwan's machinery sector will grow 4 percent in 2020 from an anticipated NT$1.06 trillion (US$34.75 billion) for 2019.

Hsiung Chih-min (熊治民), a manager of ITRI's Industrial Economics and Knowledge Center, said the global trade war has led many Taiwanese firms to return home to invest, and the impact on machinery demand of that trend should become more obvious in the second quarter of 2020.

The expected gains in 2020 will also be the result of a relatively low base of comparison in 2019, when production value will likely end up down around 9 percent from 2018 because of falling demand caused by the trade war, Hsiung said.    [FULL  STORY]