Hundreds of fishermen from Taipei County's Juifang Township yesterday protested in front of the Ministry of Economic Affairs, urging it to provide compensation for losses caused by the construction of Yuanshanzih flood-diversion sluice.
The economics ministry's Water Resources Agency began construction of the sluice three years ago. The outfall of the sluice is in the fishing zone of Juifang Fishermen's Association, which has about 3,900 members and 250 boats.
After three years of negotiation and evaluation, the agency decided in September to allocate about NT$800 million in compensation. The money was to be paid out in three installments on Oct. 20, Nov. 20 and Dec. 20.
The agency had budgeted the money last year, said Chen Ming-ching (
"So far, none of us has received a dime yet," said Lin Hsien-ming (
Even though the flood-diversion channel won't be finished until the end of the this month, the agency activated the sluice in September and October, causing more pollution in the fishing zone.
The association estimated that total losses since a flood in September reached NT$300 million.
"We have had no catch since then ? most of us are waiting for the money to start our own businesses since the zone can no longer support fishery resources," Lin said.
Another issue complicating the compensation issue is that the fishing rights in the zone that the association held for the 10 years expired in July.
Vice Minister of Economic Affairs Yin Chi-ming (
Chen said the agency would like to offer compensation as long as there is a way to determine who is qualified to receive the money and how to distribute it.
The agency planned to pay reparations to the fishermen who trade in the wholesale market, but the protesters yesterday demanded that fry and algae catchers be included in the compensation list as well.
DECOUPLING? In a sign of deeper US-China technology decoupling, Apple has held initial talks about using Baidu’s generative AI technology in its iPhones, the Wall Street Journal said China has introduced guidelines to phase out US microprocessors from Intel Corp and Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) from government PCs and servers, the Financial Times reported yesterday. The procurement guidance also seeks to sideline Microsoft Corp’s Windows operating system and foreign-made database software in favor of domestic options, the report said. Chinese officials have begun following the guidelines, which were unveiled in December last year, the report said. They order government agencies above the township level to include criteria requiring “safe and reliable” processors and operating systems when making purchases, the newspaper said. The US has been aiming to boost domestic semiconductor
Nvidia Corp earned its US$2.2 trillion market cap by producing artificial intelligence (AI) chips that have become the lifeblood powering the new era of generative AI developers from start-ups to Microsoft Corp, OpenAI and Google parent Alphabet Inc. Almost as important to its hardware is the company’s nearly 20 years’ worth of computer code, which helps make competition with the company nearly impossible. More than 4 million global developers rely on Nvidia’s CUDA software platform to build AI and other apps. Now a coalition of tech companies that includes Qualcomm Inc, Google and Intel Corp plans to loosen Nvidia’s chokehold by going
ENERGY IMPACT: The electricity rate hike is expected to add about NT$4 billion to TSMC’s electricity bill a year and cut its annual earnings per share by about NT$0.154 Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has left its long-term gross margin target unchanged despite the government deciding on Friday to raise electricity rates. One of the heaviest power consuming manufacturers in Taiwan, TSMC said it always respects the government’s energy policy and would continue to operate its fabs by making efforts in energy conservation. The chipmaker said it has left a long-term goal of more than 53 percent in gross margin unchanged. The Ministry of Economic Affairs concluded a power rate evaluation meeting on Friday, announcing electricity tariffs would go up by 11 percent on average to about NT$3.4518 per kilowatt-hour (kWh)
OPENING ADDRESS: The CEO is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing and artificial intelligence at the trade show’s opening on June 3, TAITRA said Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) chairperson and chief executive officer Lisa Su (蘇姿丰) is to deliver the opening keynote speech at Computex Taipei this year, the event’s organizer said in a statement yesterday. Su is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing (HPC) in the artificial intelligence (AI) era to open Computex, one of the world’s largest computer and technology trade events, at 9:30am on June 3, the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) said. Su is to explore how AMD and the company’s strategic technology partners are pushing the limits of AI and HPC, from data centers to