In an effort to promote the city's new garbage collection initiative -- slated to go into effect in October -- Taipei City Mayor Ma Ying-jeou
Beginning May 15, the city's 435 borough wardens will start distributing to each household 10 medium-sized garbage bags plus six coupons totaling NT$330 to purchase additional bags.
All of the city's 2.64 million residents are expected to receive the bags and coupons by mid-June.
Residents are encouraged to take the coupons to the nearest supermarket or convenience store before Aug. 31 and exchange them for garbage bags that best suit their needs.
The bags come in six different sizes: 5-liter, 14-liter, 33-liter, 45-liter, 76-liter and 92-liter.
It was announced yesterday that after July 1, only regulation-sized bags will be accepted for the collection of regular household trash.
Recyclables such as cans, jars, newspapers and clothes, however, are allowed to be put in plastic or paper shopping bags for collection.
Those residents found not using regulation-sized bags or caught leaving garbage outside specified garbage collection points will face fines ranging between NT$1,200 and NT$4,500.
Ma was joined yesterday by rapper A-Liang (Pu Hsueh-liang,
"It's a challenging job because we're trying to change residents' ingrained habits concerning garbage disposal," Ma said.
"But this is the way we must go and I'm sure determination will lead to success," he said.
Around 80,000 of the city's municipal workers have been mobilized to promote the new program, according to Ma.
"We're are in effect waging a war and it is one we will win," Ma said. "The program will benefit ourselves and many generations to come. It's importance transcends politics," he said, adding that the goal of the program is to reduce total garbage volume and to encourage people to separate garbage that can be recycled.
The new garbage initiative means that collection fees for domestic waste will now be based on the volume of trash individual households generate, as opposed to the current system which bases fees on waster consumption.
City officials are certain the program will reduce the total volume of garbage generated, basing their plan on that of South Korea, which reduced its garbage output by 23 percent between 1995 to 1998 after adopting a similar program.
The city government also insists the new scheme will save residents money. Under the current setup, the average monthly garbage fee per household is about NT$144.
Under the new initiative, officials said, the fee would be reduced to NT$140 if the volume of garbage a person generates a day does not exceed 1.1kg and if the garbage is collected every three days.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique