As Taiwan's manufacturing industry diversifies its supply chain in accordance with the China+1 strategy and the government's Southbound policy, it has been relocating factories to Southeast Asian countries.
This shift, however, has brought language and cultural challenges. The solution to these obstacles may lie within Taiwan's increasingly diverse and multicultural population.
Population diversity: the key to solve Taiwan's talent shortfall
According to Taiwan's Ministry of Education, the number of international students at universities and colleges reached 90,895 in 2020 and has continued to grow, reaching 116,038 in 2023. Additionally, Taiwan's new resident population, including first-generation immigrants and their locally-born children, has surpassed one million and continues to expand.
Since many international students and new residents come from ASEAN countries, government departments actively promote foundational education in diverse cultures and languages. The aim is to preserve the culinary traditions, customs, and languages of new residents, thereby attracting more international students and new residents to Taiwan.
This initiative addresses the country's declining birthrate and workforce shortage crisis. The National Science and Technology Council (NSTC) estimates a labor shortage of 400,000 by 2030, with Taiwan's population projected to drop below 16 million by 2070, leaving only 7.76 million in the working-age population.
According to the Ministry of the Interior, Taiwan's new resident population is around 600,000. Including their children born in Taiwan, the total exceeds one million, surpassing the indigenous population (over 270,000 plains indigenous people and over 310,000 mountain indigenous people). Unlike Indigenous populations concentrated in Hualien and Taoyuan's mountainous areas, new residents are dispersed across Taiwan's six major cities and various counties.
Taiwan's current education policy allows elementary students to choose to study either local languages or new resident languages. In middle school, new resident languages are offered as electives based on student demand. Statistics show that most ASEAN language teachers in Taiwan are from Vietnam, Indonesia, and Thailand, with fewer from Myanmar, Malaysia, and the Philippines.
The Ministry of Education has developed digital learning materials for new resident languages from Vietnam, Indonesia, Thailand, Cambodia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Myanmar. This ensures that the children of new residents in Taiwan maintain connections with their mother countries.
In 2024, 1,445 elementary and middle schools in Taiwan will offer in-person new resident language courses, totaling 7,328 classes with 16,985 participating students.
New residents, new talents
ASEAN is a crucial manufacturing region for Taiwanese companies outside of China, with its low labor costs becoming even more advantageous following the restructuring of supply chains. The second-generation new residents in Taiwan, fluent in ASEAN languages, Mandarin, and English, are valuable assets for Taiwanese companies in ASEAN.
Their presence could improve local employee management and overcome communication barriers. Well-educated new residents can also become key managers for foreign workers in Taiwan.
To prevent new residents from being limited to low-skilled jobs, the government has introduced measures to encourage them to acquire skills necessary for knowledge-based work. The Ministry of Education is offering scholarships to attract international students to study and work in Taiwan, aiming to enroll over 320,000 international students and retain over 210,000 by 2030. Most foreign students in Taiwan are coming from Vietnam, Indonesia, and Malaysia.
