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Agricultural Biotechnology Park Lights up of Taiwan Agriculture Future
Date¡G2010-10-18
Some 450 manufacturers set up 850 exhibition booths in the recently concluded Bio Taiwan 2010, 10% more than the last year, demonstrating the active development of Taiwan's biotechnology industry nowadays. The exhibition space created by the Ping-Tung Agricultural Biotechnology Park and manufacturers based in the Park was the most eye-catching. The Park Administration specially set up an elevated platform for manufacturers to hold in-depth discussions with potential partners and for interested manufacturers to receive thorough briefings from Park Administration personnel.
The physical platform, in fact, also symbolized the key platform role played by the Park in promoting the development of domestic agricultural biotechnology industry and bringing about industry-academia cooperation.
¡§ We work just like a super matchmaker, bringing businesses and academic research institutes together by matching their willingness and opportunity to cooperate, and striving to industrialize academic institutes' or research institutions' brainchild of intellectual property, upgrade the quality and quantity development of the whole agricultural biotechnology and ensure the sustainable management of agriculture,¡¨ explained Dr. Jian-bin Chen, director of the Ping-Tung Agricultural Biotechnology Park.
Situated beside the Changchih Interchange of National Freeway No. 3, the Ping-Tung Agricultural Biotechnology Park was established in October 2003 and came into operation in 2006. The Park has combined agricultural biotechnology resources of neighboring areas and provided various incentives offered by the government to create a domestic agricultural biotechnology industry cluster and develop a high-tech agricultural industry platform with R&D, production and import and export functions.
Since its opening, 14 standard factory buildings constructed in the first phase of the Park have all been occupied by manufacturers, and since the second-phase construction was completed in the first half of 2010 the Park has become the world¡¦s largest single agricultural biotechnology park with 24 contracted manufacturers and another 36 producers who built their own factories on leased land in the Park, with a total private investment of NT$4.46 billion. The Park Administration¡¦s plan is to build a total of 56 factory buildings in the Park.
The Park has flourished in the past seven years and become a comprehensive industry cluster of more than 30 functional food R&D and production, scientific herbal medicine and drug and cosmetic product manufacturers, noted Dr. Jian-bin Chen who was in charge of planning the Park right from the beginning and has worked at the Park Administration for more than 4 years.
As regard to aquatic fries and aquaculture products, Chen said although there are only 4 manufacturers based in the Park, ornamental fish has been designated by the Council of Agriculture (AOC) as one of the key quality agricultural industries for future development. The Park has planned to establish a 5.5-hectare aquarium R&D and export center, which is scheduled to be inaugurated in October 2011 will and attract more than 20 related manufacturers to build a upstream and downstream supply chain of domestic ornamental fishes with an expected output value of more than NT$2 billion and another NT$5 billion worth of extended business opportunities. The ornamental fish industry is expected to become the Park's bright star of tomorrow when it is built as a core ornamental fish production center.
Dr. Jian-bin Chen added that the Agricultural Biotechnology Park is ready for further development in 2010 with an estimated turnover of NT$2 billion, tripling that of the previous year. The Park will enter the first period of harvest next year with the expected annual turnover increasing 150% to NT$3 billion. When the third-phase is completed, the Park's annual output is estimated to reach NT$18 billion in 2014-2015, and to creat more than 6,000 working oppartunitias for Taiwan's people.
