Chinese mainland and Taiwan signed the long-awaited Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA) in Chongqing on June 29.
According to China’s Xinhua News Agency, the agreement, signed by the Chinese mainland's Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS) and Taiwan 's Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF), aims to establish a systematic mechanism for enhancing cross-Strait economic cooperation.
The ARATS and SEF handle cross-Strait issues on behalf of their respective authorities.
Under the 16-article agreement, the two sides agreed to "gradually reduce and remove trade and investment barriers and create a fair environment" in the two areas.
The agreement also provides protection for cross-Strait investments to boost two-way capital flows.
A list of items and services to benefit from the pact first with preferential duty cuts and treatment, dubbed the "early harvest programme," was agreed on by both sides.
The "early harvest programme" will launch within six months of the ECFA taking effect, the agreement said.
Under the agreement, the two sides will continue discussing agreements for commodity trade, service trade and investment for the next six months.
On the same day, a separate agreement on intellectual property rights protection (IPR) was signed by the ARATS and the SEF.
Under the IPR agreement, the Chinese mainland and Taiwan will increase exchange and cooperation to boost protection of patents, trademarks, copyright and plant variety rights (PVR).
At present, the Chinese mainland is the largest trade partner of Taiwan . Taiwanese investors invested at least 83 billion USD in the mainland in the past two decades. There are some 40,000 Taiwanese-invested businesses in the mainland.
Source: VNA