Dr. Christopher M. Dent is a Senior Lecturer in the East Asian Economy in the Department of East Asian Studies at the University of Leeds, UK. Currently, he is writing a book on the proliferation of free trade agreement (FTA) projects in the Asia-Pacific.
As visiting fellow at EUTW, he delivered two speeches at NTU on November 10, 2010. One of his topics was about FTA Policies in the Asia-Pacific and Taiwan’s Choices. He concluded that FTAs have transformed the economic diplomacy landscape in the Asia-Pacific and globally. The EU’s new FTA projects with Asian nations are to avoid marginalization in world trade system. In Asia, Taiwan has the economic, technocratic and institutional strengths to sign a wide-ranging FTA. Taiwan could be an important FTA partner to the EU in this region. Or Taiwan could find a new FTA partner like Japan, Singapore or South Korea. But Beijing’s opposition to Taiwan signing FTAs with China’s diplomatic partners may still hold, even after an ECFA deal is done.