The Transportation Ministry on Friday held a press conference promoting the success of Taiwan’s free ports, saying they will play an important role in supply chains in the AI-based economy.
Head of the ministry’s aviation department Han Chen-hua (韓振華) says Taiwan has six free sea port zones and one free air port zone. After supply chain shifts caused by the COVID-19 pandemic in 2021, the zones grew their economic output each year. Han says 2023 was the first time the zones surpassed the NT$1 trillion mark, reaching a total economic value of NT$1.29 trillion (US$41 billion).
Han says more than a third of the free sea port’s economic output comes from the storage and transfer of semiconductor components and high-tech equipment. He says a new smart industrial park will be built at the Taipei Gangnan Wharf. The park will cover an area of 62.6 hectares and will be the site for the building and shipping of what Han calls Asia’s first 5G self-driving car.
Han says that as more and more Taiwanese entrepreneurs bring their operations back to Taiwan, the Taoyuan free air zone has also been expanding. He adds that it has attracted large international chipmakers such as Nvidia and AMD to establish warehousing bases for the Asia-Pacific market.
Han says that new land developments at the Port of Taipei and Taoyuan Airport are also in the works, aiming to draw more value-added industries such as generative AI. He adds that with the addition of these free port areas, Taiwan can become a global logistics center.