President Ma Ying-jeou on the morning of September 1 met with participants in the 7th World Technopolis Association's University Presidents Forum. President Ma, on behalf of the government and people of the ROC, extended a cordial welcome to the visitors.
Noting that this year's event would address such issues as biotechnology, green energy, high-end agriculture, the cultural and creative industries, cloud computing, smart electric vehicles, and green buildings, the president stated that all of these topics coincide with some of the core focus areas of the ROC government's economic and technological development plans. The president explained that Taiwan lacks natural resources and as a result must cultivate top-notch human resources, which is why education is extremely important here. President Ma furthermore stated that the government is presently working on building up Taiwan as a global center for innovation, an Asia-Pacific regional economic and trade hub, a global operations headquarters for Taiwan companies, and a regional operations center for foreign firms.
The president remarked that Taiwan's competitiveness is highly rated by many international organizations. For instance, the World Economic Forum in its 2009-2010 global competitiveness report ranked Taiwan's ability to innovate as sixth in the world. Within this category, Taiwan led the world in the number of patents per million people.
President Ma stressed that the government hopes that our research and development spending in two years will rise to 3% of GDP. In an effort to reach this goal, the government's annual R&D budget will need to grow at a pace of 8-10%, he said, adding that this objective has been met thus far.
The president also spoke about the internationalization of Taiwan's universities, and said that colleges and universities could introduce English-only degree programs to recruit foreign students. Meanwhile, the Legislative Yuan recently approved legislation to allow mainland Chinese students to study in Taiwan. This will provide young people from the two sides of the Taiwan Strait more opportunities to interact, which will support the education industry here and foster internationalization, he said.
President Ma stated that Taiwan and mainland China have signed a cross-strait Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement that is expected to not only hasten Taiwan's internationalization and prevent its economy from being marginalized, but also systematize cross-strait trade. This will be conducive to Taiwan's economic growth and liberalization, and he said that strengthened cooperation with universities from throughout the world will play an extremely important role in this process.
The delegation members included University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Chancellor and Provost (interim) Robert A. Easter, City University of Hong Kong President Way Kuo, University of California at Berkeley Vice Chancellor for Research Graham Fleming, Korea University President Ki-su Lee, Vietnam National University in Hanoi President Mai Trong Nhuan, North Carolina State University Vice Provost for International Affairs Bailian Li, Korea University Vice President Yong-Chul Choi, Vietnam National University in Hanoi Deputy Director of International Affairs Tuan Le Anh, National Chiao Tung University President Peter Chung-Yu Wu, Interuniversity Microelectronics Center Vice President Roger De Keersmaecker, University of Tunku Abdul Rahman Vice President Ewe Hong Tat, Hanoi University of Natural Sciences Vice President Nguyen Van Noi, and National Chiao Tung University Dean of International Affairs Shang-Hwa Hsu. The group was accompanied to the Office of the President by Education Minister Wu Ching-ji. Also sitting in on the meeting was National Security Council Deputy Secretary-General Chih-kung Liu.