Taipei is expanding its international links with plans to develop electronic trading exchanges in one of Central America’s historic centres for international trade

Below is an article published by Focus Taiwan:

Taiwan signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Panama Wednesday on the establishment of a public key infrastructure (PKI) that will help enable the two countries to promote electronic trading exchanges.

Vice Minister of Economic Affairs Francis Kuo-Hsin Liang and Panamanian Deputy Minister of Industry and Commerce Ricardo Quijano signed the MOU at a ceremony at the ministry in Taipei.

The deal aims to expand cooperation in economic technology, Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) officials said, noting that joint efforts in the field were part of the Taiwan-Panama free trade agreement that was inked in 2003.

The officials said the PKI is a certification mechanism for online trading that will ensure the safety of user identities and details of deals made through e-commerce services.

A PKI allows users of an otherwise unsecured public network to safely and privately exchange data and money by using coded "keys" provided by a trusted third party.

The MOEA said that with the agreement, Taiwan and Panama will begin jointly promoting the transfer of technical information, educational training, data and information, as well as increasing personnel interaction to pave the way for the launch of e-trading between the countries.

Since Taiwan began its PKI establishment project in 2003, it has issued nearly 970,000 MOEA Certification Authority (MOEACA) IC cards for business entities (including companies, franchises and proprietors) in Taiwan and 2.07 million Ministry of Interior Certification Authority (MOICA) IC cards for individual citizens. The MOEA said more than 50 million deals have been made online by certificate holders.

Currently, 1.4 million users of Internet banking services conduct online deals through the PKI mechanism in Taiwan, according to the MOEA.