The National Development Council (NDC) yesterday teamed up with the Council of Indigenous Peoples, the Ministry of Finance and several state-run lenders to issue NT$200 million (US$7.22 million) of electronic consumption vouchers aimed at supporting consumer activity in small and rural towns.
The move came after the government announced that it would provide NT$5,000 of consumption vouchers next month to people who participate in its Quintuple Stimulus Voucher program to help reinvigorate consumer activity and bolster businesses hit by virus containment measures.
NDC Minister Kung Ming-hsin (龔明鑫) told a news conference in Taipei that the extra vouchers would be distributed in two batches to help promote businesses in small and rural towns, in keeping with the ministry’s effort to narrow the demographic and economic gaps between Taiwan’s urban and rural areas.
Photo: CNA
The council has the financial means to advance a policy that seeks to encourage young people to move back to their hometowns, and open businesses that showcase local history and culture, Kong said.
The policy also seeks to help tackle imbalanced development between urban and rural areas, growing unemployment among young people and the unaffordability of housing in popular locations, he added.
Bank of Taiwan (臺灣銀行) and other state-run lenders are supporting the effort by offering bonus credits to winners of the extra vouchers, which are valid at more than 1,000 stores in small towns across Taiwan before April 30 next year, Kung said.
Hopefully, the extra vouchers would motivate people to visit less popular parts of Taiwan and gain a better appreciation of local communities, he said.
People interested in winning the extra electronic vouchers of NT$500 per person would need to enter an online drawing, Kong said, adding that the second batch would become available during the Lunar New Year holiday next year.
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last