Taiwan plans to boost its economic stimulus package to 500 billion Taiwan dollars (15.01 billion US) amid signs of growing economic deterioration, officials said Thursday.
The Council for Economic Planning and Development, the top government economic planning agency in Taiwan, said it planned to propose an 80 billion Taiwan dollars (2.4 billion US) increase to the mega-economic stimulus plan slated to be implemented over the next four years.
The original blueprint was an extra 420 billion dollars that was earmarked for infrastructure projects running from 2009 to 2012, plus 82.9 billion dollars-worth of shopping vouchers to be handed out next year to stimulate the economy.
"Our proposal is to raise the infrastructure expansion projects by 80 billion to 500 billion dollars for the next four years," said an official of the council.
"The revision is to be submitted to the Executive Yuan for approval at a quarterly cabinet meeting next Thursday," the official added.
The proposed stimulus package would create an estimated 200,000 jobs, the United Evening News reported, citing another official from the council.