The Footwear Technology Centre of La Rioja, CTCR, has functioned as a mediator in a meeting between businessmen of the footwear industry and the Taiwanese delegation, headed by the representative of the Economic and Cultural Office of Taiwan in Spain, Simon Shen-Yeaw Ko, who was accompanied by the Minister of Economic Development and Innovation of La Rioja, Leonor González Menorca, and other institutional representatives. The aim of the meeting was to learn about the technological opportunities of Taiwan for leading industrial sectors of La Rioja. In this sense, Simon Shen-Yeaw Ko said specialization is one of the aspects the footwear from La Rioja should consider if entering the Taiwanese market. "Taiwan has a remarkable footwear industry, specialized in sports shoes. The shoes from La Rioja can be differentiated from the rest of the market by specializing, for example, in the leather shoe with an attractive design".
The Managing Director of the CTCR, Javier Oñate, has welcomed the delegation, showing them the facilities during a tour and exhibiting the R&D&I progresses developed at the CTCR, which offers great technological opportunities to the footwear manufacturers, enabling products and production process improvements.
In this regard, it should be pointed out that the footwear industry is one of the best-selling products outside Spain. Specifically, in 2015 the sales of Spanish footwear was worth 189.69 million euros, 7.09% more than in 2014. France is the main destination for Spanish footwear, receiving 22% of the total export quota and leading the ranking of destinations in Europe, followed by Italy, Germany, UK and Portugal. The United States is the first destination of footwear exports from La Rioja outside the EU and sixth in the world rankings. However, La Rioja footwear and its components are sold in many other countries around the world, such as Taiwan. Specifically, footwear and its components are the third group of products acquired by the Taiwanese market from La Rioja. Overall, the Republic of China, is the number thirteen in the ranking (43 million euros). The data shows a rise of 7.6% in value, even with a drop 3.3% in volume. Taiwanese markets continues having very high value in the average export price (40.44 € / pair).
