The explosions at Formosa Petrochemical Corp’s Sixth Naphtha Cracker Plant in Mailiao Township (麥寮), Yunlin County, last month, seem to have developed from an issue of industrial safety into a political power struggle. One cannot help but wonder if this will speed up a resolution of the problem.
It is important that we review the problems the plant has experienced and demand that Formosa Petrochemical make good on its social obligation to clean up the pollution caused by the explosions as well as offering compensation to those affected.
Formosa Plastics Group has made a significant contribution to Taiwan’s economic development, but it has also been provided with considerable resources and opportunities by the government, growing from a rice trader into a huge and powerful conglomerate.
Formosa Petrochemical Corp chairman Wilfred Wang (王文潮) emphasized the group’s contribution to the economy and employment, but companies are also expected to abide by environmental protection and labor laws. Today, many firms even take on a philanthropic role by making community donations and seeking to improve the quality of the local environment.
The manufacturing process in the petrochemical industry is highly dangerous and the pollution caused by the recent explosions was examined by a number of chemical and medical experts, so the public is aware of the seriousness of the matter. Thanks to news reports on both television and the Internet, the public identifies with the furious residents of Mailiao. Such contamination has a long-term impact not only on the livelihood of local farmers and fishermen, but also on groundwater and ecology.
Because of the highly contaminative nature of the industry, Formosa Petrochemical should hold itself to higher environmental and industrial safety standards to remain beyond reproach. It should also work to improve relations with local communities and carry out relief and environmental protection work.
In Taiwan, economic development has always trumped social development, and Taiwanese have paid the price in terms of environmental degradation.
The government should remain objective and handle the recent spate of industrial accidents at Formosa Petrochemical in accordance with the law.
The Yunlin County Government should also provide assistance with any follow up work.
It is to be hoped that Formosa Petrochemical will keep its promise to obey the law, assist the local community, prevent pollution, reduce gas emissions, promote risk management, improve operations and carry out sustainable management.
More important is the question: Should Taiwan continue to develop its petrochemical industry? More than 1,000 local and international experts have expressed their opposition to the eighth naphtha cracker plant proposed by Kuokuang Petrochemical Technology Company in Changhua County. Hopefully the government will review their arguments and there will be public dialogue to determine what is best for Taiwan’s long-term development.
Han Tzu-Shian is a professor in the Department of Business Administration at National Chengchi University.
TRANSLATED BY EDDY CHANG
Donald Trump’s return to the White House has offered Taiwan a paradoxical mix of reassurance and risk. Trump’s visceral hostility toward China could reinforce deterrence in the Taiwan Strait. Yet his disdain for alliances and penchant for transactional bargaining threaten to erode what Taiwan needs most: a reliable US commitment. Taiwan’s security depends less on US power than on US reliability, but Trump is undermining the latter. Deterrence without credibility is a hollow shield. Trump’s China policy in his second term has oscillated wildly between confrontation and conciliation. One day, he threatens Beijing with “massive” tariffs and calls China America’s “greatest geopolitical
Ahead of US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) meeting today on the sidelines of the APEC summit in South Korea, an op-ed published in Time magazine last week maliciously called President William Lai (賴清德) a “reckless leader,” stirring skepticism in Taiwan about the US and fueling unease over the Trump-Xi talks. In line with his frequent criticism of the democratically elected ruling Democratic Progressive Party — which has stood up to China’s hostile military maneuvers and rejected Beijing’s “one country, two systems” framework — Lyle Goldstein, Asia engagement director at the US think tank Defense Priorities, called
A large majority of Taiwanese favor strengthening national defense and oppose unification with China, according to the results of a survey by the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC). In the poll, 81.8 percent of respondents disagreed with Beijing’s claim that “there is only one China and Taiwan is part of China,” MAC Deputy Minister Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) told a news conference on Thursday last week, adding that about 75 percent supported the creation of a “T-Dome” air defense system. President William Lai (賴清德) referred to such a system in his Double Ten National Day address, saying it would integrate air defenses into a
The central bank has launched a redesign of the New Taiwan dollar banknotes, prompting questions from Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators — “Are we not promoting digital payments? Why spend NT$5 billion on a redesign?” Many assume that cash will disappear in the digital age, but they forget that it represents the ultimate trust in the system. Banknotes do not become obsolete, they do not crash, they cannot be frozen and they leave no record of transactions. They remain the cleanest means of exchange in a free society. In a fully digitized world, every purchase, donation and action leaves behind data.
RSS