Taiwan's Machinery Imports Grow Slowly April-June

Taipei, July 11, 2008 (CENS)--Taiwan saw clear signs of slowing growth in machinery imports during April, May and June, according to statistic compiled by the Taiwan Association of Machinery Industry (TAMI).

The TAMI's tallies showed Taiwan imported US$9.589 billion of machinery in the first half of this year, an11.1% growth from a year earlier. But the year-on-year growth has been on the wane since the beginning of this year based on monthly import statistics.

The year-on-year growth for imported machinery reached 28.6% in the first three months of this year, but the growth rate declined to 23.3% and 15.7% in the first four months and five months of this year, respectively.

Despite the slide in growth rate for imported machinery, Taiwan still saw a robust growth in exports of machinery in the first half of this year. The TAMI's tallies showed Taiwan exported US$8.227 billion worth of machinery in the first half of this year, up 12.7% year-on-year.

The TAMI attributed the decline in growth in imported machinery to the sagging investment by domestic industries due to mounting threat of spiraling international crude oil price and global inflationary pressure.

Another factor contributing to the slow growth in imported machinery is the import-substitute effect as over the past several years Taiwan government has been encouraging domestic manufacturers to develop production equipment for such high-tech industries as semiconductor and TFT-LCD (thin film transistor-liquid crystal display), hence reducing the volume of imports.

TAMI vice president C.C. Wang said the machines imported by Taiwan are production equipment for energy, power generating, iron and steel and petrochemical employed by the government agencies and state-run enterprises; and manufacturing equipment employed by semiconductor, optoelectronics and biotechnology industries; as well as precision processing equipment employed by medium and small enterprises.

Wang said the uncertainty of domestic economy under the global inflationary pressure has affected the above-mentioned industries to make further investments in Taiwan.