Taiwan’s top trade negotiator has signaled a desire to expand Taipei’s initial agreement with Washington into one that more closely resembles a free trade deal, as the export-dependent economy works to counter China’s efforts at isolating it.
The island’s trade officials are talking with their U.S. counterparts about broadening the scope of their current arrangement, reached earlier this year, John Deng, the head of Taiwan’s Office of Trade Negotiations, said in an interview in Taipei last week.
"One goal is to expand the coverage: more topics like agriculture, labor. We are willing to talk, whatever (an) international trade regime needs to address,” Deng said. "Second is the market access issue, that is tariffs. We hope that one day the U.S. government is ready for tariff talk.”