Taiwan pineapple in a supermarket in Yiwu, East China's Zhejiang Province Photo: VCG

Only via deepening economic exchange and cooperation with the mainland, can the Taiwan island achieve better economic development and benefits for its people amid a world full of uncertainties, spokesperson of the Taiwan Affairs Office of State Council Zhu Fenglian responded Wednesday when asked for comments on decreasing trade volume between the two sides on the Taiwan Straits as the Democratic Progressive Party on the island attempts to follow the US' footsteps and decouple from the mainland 

According to the data from the mainland customs, the export-import volume between the two sides of the Taiwan Straits decreased by 26.5 percent in the first quarter this year compared with the same period last year. Data released by the island authorities indicated that export of the island also declined by 19.2 percent in the first quarter year-on-year. 

Facts have proven that in order to maintain its hegemony, the US has hijacked normal international economic and trade cooperation, monopolized technologies and suppressed others in the high-tech field, coerced some countries and regions to contain China's development, and artificially created "decoupling" and "cutting off [supply] chains," Zhu said. 

This has seriously affected the stability of the supply chain of the global industrial chain, including the trade cooperation between the two sides of the Taiwan Straits, she noted. 

However, out of the political nature of "relying on the US to seek independence," the Democratic Progressive Party authorities are willing to sacrifice Taiwan's economic prospects and destroy the jobs of the people in the Taiwan island in order to seek their own self-interest, Zhu noted. 

"On one hand, they restrict and suppress cross-Straits economic and trade exchanges and cooperation in various fields, and set up many obstacles for normal cross-Straits economic, trade and personnel exchanges; on the other, they coordinated with some anti-China forces in the US-led West and handed over the island's core advantageous industries, leading the Taiwan island to lose a large number of technical talents and economic wealth," Zhu pointed out.

These behaviors resulted in the island's slow economic growth, reduced exports, rising prices, and widening gap between rich and poor have become more prominent, which seriously damaged the interests of Taiwan compatriots, Zhu added.

Zhu stressed that cross-Straits economic and trade cooperation is the driving force and opportunity for the Taiwan island's economic development. For the island's economy, in face of an international economic environment full of uncertainty, only by resolutely opposing the cross-Straits economic decoupling and the disconnection of industrial chains on both sides, but further deepen cross-Straits economic exchanges, can Taiwan island take advantage of the mainland's huge market, abundant resources, and complete industrial support to help its economy achieve better growth, and benefit more Taiwan compatriots and Taiwanese enterprises, Zhu noted. 

Global Times