Beijing’s trade tactics ahead of Taiwan election force exporters into new markets

As island’s voters prepare to elect new leaders, Beijing uses import bans and economic ties to send message that DPP victory could equal ‘disaster’

Taiwanese businesses, long dependent on mainland China, are looking to sell products elsewhere as they brace for worsening cross-strait tensions

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Published: 7:00am, 9 Jan 2024Updated: 2:50pm, 9 Jan 2024

Taiwanese fish farm owner Chen Yu-ying has spent a lot of his free time lately squeezing into small lecture rooms with 50 to 60 village elders to explain how to expand their business to markets other than mainland China.

Many of those who attend the government-sponsored lectures are affiliated with the more than 2,000 fisheries hit by Beijing’s ban on grouper from the island. While Beijing announced late last month it would reopen the mainland market to seven Taiwanese companies that export the fish, theirs were not among the lucky few.

“China’s ban on our fish was a wake-up call that we need to diversify our export destinations,” said Chen, 43, who also heads a fishing business association in Taiwan’s southernmost county of Pingtung.

As Taiwan’s pivotal presidential election approaches, Beijing has been clear in sending a political message with its economic tactics: Taiwanese voters are choosing between “peace versus war” and “prosperity versus decline”. Mainland state media have warned that a victory for the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) would push Taiwan into the “abyss of disaster”.

Regardless of who wins the January 13 election, Chen and other representatives of Taiwanese businesses – from fish farms to chemical manufacturers – say they are now clear-eyed about the need to minimise as much as possible their dependence on trade with mainland China as they expect more turbulence in cross-strait relations.

While Chen has already registered his own fish farm to export to other markets, he volunteers to help elders who want to branch out but find the government’s registration process hard to understand.

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