TAIPEI: Taiwan’s three major science-based industrial parks, home to the country’s mainstay semiconductor and electronics industries, reported a 4.89 percent year-on-year decline in revenue in the first half of the year, the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) said Wednesday.
Production revenue at the three parks totaled NT$1.078 trillion (US$34.2 billion) in the first six months of this year, down from the NT$1.134 trillion registered a year ago, the MOST said. The output of Hsinchu Science Park fell by 10.02 percent year-on-year to NT$492.3 billion in the first half of this year, while that of Central Taiwan Science Park dipped by 1.98 percent to NT$236.9 billion and Southern Taiwan Science Park bucked the declining trend by recording a yearly increase of 1.2 percent with the six-month revenue of NT$348.8 billion, MOST statistics showed.
Among the industries in the science parks, the optoelectronic industry suffered the steepest drop in revenue, recording a yearly decline of 17.81 percent, the manufacturing of computer and peripherals dipped by 6.94 percent and the IC industry fell by 0.41 percent. During the same period, the precision machinery industry registered a rapid increase of 18.81 percent year-on-year, while the biotechnology industry and the info-communications industry grew by 12.87 percent and 1.69 percent, respectively, the statistics showed.
The exports of the three science parks totaled NT$639.6 billion in the first six months of this year, representing a decrease of 4.03 percent year-on-year, while the imports of the parks declined by 3.63 percent to NT$354.2 billion, the MOST said.
The ministry predicted however that the combined revenue of the three parks will grow by an annual 3 percent this year to NT$2.38 trillion, based on an up trend of the parks’ revenues.
