Taipei City Government

The 26^th World Taiwanese Chambers of Commerce (WTCC) Congress took place at the Grand Hotel on September 29. Despite the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the event was held successfully while complying with the government’s pandemic prevention measures.
 
This year’s conference is a hybrid event integrating physical event with a number of attendees participating over the Internet.
 
According to the organizers, there were over 500 people attending the event at the venue in Taipei. Roughly 400 overseas Taiwanese merchant traveled back to Taiwan from around the world and showed their support for Taipei’s MICE industry.
 
During his address, Mayor Ko Wen-je pointed out that Taipei is a great place to hold international conferences, as shown by the 1-rank improvement (from 6^th to 5^th place) in the 2019 Asia’s Top Convention City ranking published by ICCA. He invites WTCC members to choose Taipei for upcoming editions of the event in the future.
 
The mayor pointed out that despite the pandemic, Taipei’s GDP reported a slight drop of 0.76-percent. The capability to maintain regular economic activities during this age and time is extremely valuable. Taipei share of the island’s foreign direct investment is 75-percent, and that is the reason why the city government established the Invest Taipei Office to encourage overseas Taiwanese merchants to reinvest in the city. In response to the impact of the pandemic upon economics, the city government also established 9 task forces to organizer seminars and conferences to join the business sector in exploring possible strategies for the post-pandemic world’s “New Normal”.
 
Following the opening ceremony, the organizers of WTCC invited Deputy Mayor Tsai Ping-kun to talk about the city government’s efforts in planning a ‘Borderless Museum’ in Taipei by choosing 5 neighborhoods as a start – Beitou, Dadaocheng, Wanhua District’s Bangka, North City Corridor, and NTU to the South of the city.