Youths' innovation, startups on display at Guangzhou Taiwan fair

The ongoing session of the Guangzhou Taiwan Commodities Fair is showcasing Taiwan youths' innovation and entrepreneurial projects in Guangzhou and Taiwan's health industry for the first time.

The event, part of the 26th Guangzhou Fair, is being held at the China Import and Export Fair Complex in Guangzhou between Aug 24 and 27.

Taiwan-invested Freshtalk (Guangzhou) Agricultural Technology Co, registered last month, is presenting its vegetables grown with soil-free cultivation technology and organic fertilizer at the fair.

The company produces 30 to 40 kilograms of 30 types of vegetables per day, and is building a new factory in Guangzhou to expand capacity, said Jay Chen, general manager of the company from Taiwan.

Employing four young people from Taiwan and three from the mainland, the company supplies vegetables to a Taiwan-invested bakery in Guangzhou and will start selling its products on a WeChat online store next month.

Y&B International Baby School, which provides baby-sitting services for children under the age of 3 and banks on Taiwan's teachers and expertise in this sector, is setting up its first facility in Guangzhou, said Cheng Ming-chia, a joint founder of the company.

The mainland presents rigorous demand for these services, with strong demand also coming from large companies which intend to offer such services to employees.

The company plans to have five facilities in the city by the end of this year and 10 more next year, with an additional five to be established for corporate customers next year.

The company has eight teachers from Taiwan and plans to have 40 by the end of this year, providing job training to local hires.

Guangzhou has seen about 100 new startup projects from young Taiwan entrepreneurs in the past three years, involving supercomputing technology, fashion e-commerce, biotechnology, energy saving and environmental protection, comics and animation, and food franchising, according to the Taiwan affairs office of the Guangzhou city government.

In the past three years, about 2,000 young people from Taiwan have landed jobs -- mainly in the information technology, healthcare, financial service and higher education sectors -- or started a business in Guangzhou.

Twenty-six professionals from Taiwan have received talent-based green cards from the Guangzhou city government.

The 60-point measures issued recently by the Guangzhou city government to boost exchanges and cooperation with Taiwan are highlighted at the fair.