Taiwan's Democratic Progressive Party will stage a rally today to protest against a trade pact the island is to sign with the mainland on Tuesday.
Branding the Economic Co-operation Framework Agreement (ECFA) a sugar-coated poison pill for the island, the pro-independence party plans to mass 100,000 supporters in front of Taipei's Presidential Office to demand the mainland-friendly government of President Ma Ying-jeou halt its plan for a cross-strait, semi-free-trade pact.
'Do you know what the real impact of ECFA would bring to us in the next decade?' DPP chairwoman Dr Tsai Ing-wen asked. 'Do you know what the political impact would be for China to make such big concessions?'
The mainland and Taiwanese sides agreed to the details of the pact in preparatory talks in Taipei on Thursday. The mainland side made a big economic sacrifice by agreeing to cut tariffs on 539 Taiwanese products to zero in two years in exchange for similar treatment for just 267 mainland items.
The 539 products, worth US$13.8 billion, represent 16 per cent of the island's total exports to the mainland. The mainland's 267 items, worth US$2.86 billion, represent 10.5 per cent of its exports to Taiwan.
Taiwan also stands to save US$2.24 million in tariffs on 18 agricultural products, which will be allowed to enter the mainland tariff-free in two years, an arrangement that will boost the value of the products exported to the mainland to US$110 million, up from US$16.1 million, according to the island's Council of Agriculture.
Other arrangements, including permitting Taiwanese banks to operate yuan currency business for mainland-based Taiwanese companies, allowing Taiwanese to open hospitals on the mainland, and maintaining tariffs on textile products and 16 other Taiwanese items considered at risk from mainland competition, were all seen as big concessions from the mainland.
