The Yilan Green Expo has been taking place for over a decade and has become one of the most recognized environmental awareness activities in the country. This year, the event is back at the Wulaokeng Scenic Area (武荖坑風景區) where it will play host to a huge range of family activities for a total of 51 days. The expo, which opens tomorrow, combines tourism, food, entertainment and education in a single massive event that has greatly raised awareness of Yilan’s efforts to establish itself as a new Eden, an escape back to nature for residents of Taiwan’s overdeveloped west coast.
The 2013 Green Expo has adopted the theme of Return to the Forest, and promises visitors to Wulaokeng Scenic Area not just the beautiful scenery and warm welcome for which Yilan is already famous, but also a chance to reflect on issues such as bringing back a balance between the drive for production and the need to establish a quality of life. Finding a sustainable solution to preserving our modern lifestyles and conserving Taiwan’s increasingly threatened natural habitat tops the agenda, though you probably wouldn’t guess it from the host of fun activities, lucky draws, performances and DIY workshops to be found there.
Yilan County commissioner Lin Tsung-hsien (林聰賢) said that “natural agriculture, tourism, LOHAS lifestyle and healthy living, and experience and learning about nature” would be the keystones of this year’s event. Natural agriculture is an issue of growing importance given that Taiwan, according to a recent report based on the World Economic Forum’s Environmental Sustainability Index published by the Kuanshu Educational Foundation (觀樹教育基金會), is reported as being the heaviest user of chemical fertilizers and pesticides in the world. LOHAS is an acronym for Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability, a buzzword that has caught on in Taiwan through its linking of environmental issues with personal health. While it will take much more than Yilan’s Green Expo to change Taiwan’s agricultural habits, which for the large part continue to favor the use of chemicals to boost yields, Lin said that this year’s event, with the creation of an “organic lifestyle area,” would be an important milestone in pushing forward the policy of the “organic new Yilan.”
Photo Courtesy of the Lanyang Agricultural Development Foundation
Photo Courtesy of the Lanyang Agricultural Development Foundation
Photo Courtesy of the Lanyang Agricultural Development Foundation
This year will go down in the history books. Taiwan faces enormous turmoil and uncertainty in the coming months. Which political parties are in a good position to handle big changes? All of the main parties are beset with challenges. Taking stock, this column examined the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) (“Huang Kuo-chang’s choking the life out of the TPP,” May 28, page 12), the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) (“Challenges amid choppy waters for the DPP,” June 14, page 12) and the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) (“KMT struggles to seize opportunities as ‘interesting times’ loom,” June 20, page 11). Times like these can
June 23 to June 29 After capturing the walled city of Hsinchu on June 22, 1895, the Japanese hoped to quickly push south and seize control of Taiwan’s entire west coast — but their advance was stalled for more than a month. Not only did local Hakka fighters continue to cause them headaches, resistance forces even attempted to retake the city three times. “We had planned to occupy Anping (Tainan) and Takao (Kaohsiung) as soon as possible, but ever since we took Hsinchu, nearby bandits proclaiming to be ‘righteous people’ (義民) have been destroying train tracks and electrical cables, and gathering in villages
Dr. Y. Tony Yang, Associate Dean of Health Policy and Population Science at George Washington University, argued last week in a piece for the Taipei Times about former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) leading a student delegation to the People’s Republic of China (PRC) that, “The real question is not whether Ma’s visit helps or hurts Taiwan — it is why Taiwan lacks a sophisticated, multi-track approach to one of the most complex geopolitical relationships in the world” (“Ma’s Visit, DPP’s Blind Spot,” June 18, page 8). Yang contends that the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) has a blind spot: “By treating any
Swooping low over the banks of a Nile River tributary, an aid flight run by retired American military officers released a stream of food-stuffed sacks over a town emptied by fighting in South Sudan, a country wracked by conflict. Last week’s air drop was the latest in a controversial development — private contracting firms led by former US intelligence officers and military veterans delivering aid to some of the world’s deadliest conflict zones, in operations organized with governments that are combatants in the conflicts. The moves are roiling the global aid community, which warns of a more militarized, politicized and profit-seeking trend
RSS