Biotechnology: the next engine of growth for Taiwan's economy? The Taiwanese government is investing heavily in biotech infrastructure and researchers in an effort to repeat the country's success with IT technologies.

Abstract

On a recent visit to the Genome Research Center (GRC) at Taiwan's National Yang‐Ming University in Taipei, its director, Kwang‐Jen Hsiao, pointed to a brightly highlighted line in a list of contributors to the Human Genome Project (HGP). ‘If we [were one of the official HGP consortium members],’ he said, ‘that is where we should be.’ The list—reproduced and altered to include the GRC—was from a page in the historic February 2001 issue of the journal Nature . GRC's contribution, 12 megabases of work mostly on Chromosome 4, was about two‐thirds down the page. Taiwan's role in the HGP—hidden but significant—is reflective of the country's position in the world‐wide biotechnology community. But the assumption that it is only a minor player belies the fervour of recent efforts to build a research infrastructure and to develop its biotechnology sector. Indeed, biotechnology has moved into Taiwan's science parks and onto the national agenda. It has gained the commitment of the government, and expectations are high that this will become the next engine of Taiwanese economic growth. In 1997, the value of new biotechnology industries in Taiwan was estimated at $14.7 billion Taiwan dollars (€440 million) and the Ministry of Economic Affairs predicts that it will grow to NT$80 billion (€2.5 billion) by 2005. With growing interest from the government, businesses and venture capital firms, hopes are high in Taiwan that the factors which led to the island's strength in semiconductor manufacture and IT‐related industries will also translate to biotechnology. But there are many differences between the two industries and the learning curve may prove to be steep. In addition, not only must Taiwan play ‘catch‐up’ within a fairly narrow window of time and against strong international competition, but the island's size and limited experience—23 million people and a high‐tech history that spans …