Economist Derek Scissors is urging Taiwan to diversify its international investment portfolio and seek a bilateral investment treaty with the US.

Scissors, a research fellow with the Asian Studies Center at the Washington-based Heritage Foundation, says that the US and Taiwan have an extraordinarily intense trading relationship.

With a population of 23 million, Taiwan is the US’ ninth-largest trading partner. However, excluding the microstates, it is actually the US’ third-largest trading nation on a “per person” basis.