As a scientist you will appreciate another difficulty we face. Despite repeated calls by local non-governmental organizations and offers from an advisory group comprised of some of the world’s leading cetacean specialists, Taiwan has ignored all “science” other than that produced by Taiwanese pursuant to government agency or business retainers. There are very few, if any, scientists in Taiwan producing objective, peer-reviewed work on Taiwan’s cetaceans and their habitat.
The founder of the Taiwan Cetacean Society (TCS) and a professor at Taiwan’s leading university, however, is the person that local academics and the government rely on as the leading authority. As of this time the TCS has been retained by two of the major developers, Formosa Plastics Group and Taiwan Power Co, to conduct surveys and produce reports on the dolphins.
During a presentation by the TCS representative at the second NCSD meeting on the dolphins, slides on the distribution of the dolphins showed the attending government officials and academics that there were seemingly no dolphins in an area of Changhua County where they are known to swim and for which other scientists had confirmed and published findings in literature cited by the TCS authority in her reports.
Fortunately NGOs were present and questioned the omission. The presenter responded by saying that her current surveys did not cover the area in question. Coincidentally, this is an area where the government wants to build an extremely controversial “petrochemical park” by “reclamation” of one of the most diverse inter-tidal zones on the island.
Ironically, two meetings to discuss environmental impact assessments related to the reclamation project were held yesterday, the same day as the opening day of this forum.
Promotion of highly polluting and fresh-water-intensive development throughout the area is the hallmark of the current and previous administrations.
While we sincerely hope that useful discussions take place at this year’s International Forum on Sustainable Development, we hope that you will join us in telling the Taiwanese government that actions speak louder than words — that this forum, the humpback dolphin meetings and all other NCSD meetings on sustainable development will be meaningless if the Executive Yuan does not mobilize its agencies to respond with action to the crises under discussion.
We hope that you will help bring this to the attention of the government and request that action be taken immediately for the sake of the humpback dolphins and the long-term survival of wildlife and human communities throughout Taiwan.
Pan Han-shen is the secretary-general of Green Party Taiwan.
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