Officials consider some revised rules for matchmakers

Marriage matchmakers, a traditional Chinese occupation, will have to register their businesses with the government and may face further regulation if the Judicial Yuan revises its 1971 adjudication, which stipulates that matchmakers can not profit from their activities.

"The industry of marriage matchmakers didn't cause any problems 30 years ago. But it's time for the government's authority to solve the problems caused by their commercial activities," Chien Tai-lang (簡太郎), Vice Minister of the Ministry of the Interior, said after the ministry's conference on on foreign brides yesterday.

Chien, however, said that how the industry would be regulated and which department would be in charge has not been determined yet.

After the Judicial Yuan's 1971 adjudication, the government has neglected implementing regulations for matchmakers, and the industry has grown over the past 30 years.

Under Article 573 of the Civil Code, an agreement promising a remuneration for matrimonial brokerage is void.

Most marriages between Taiwanese men and foreign women involve men who have had difficulty in finding Taiwanese wives. The marriage matchmaker industry developed to meet the needs of these men.

The Cabinet's Consumer Product Commission Council attended the ministry's meeting yesterday to present the numerous appeals asking the council to mediate disputes with marriage brokerage companies.

These disputes usually arise after a Taiwanese groom's foreign spouse disappears after the wedding or after the prospective groom has paid a large amount of money without receiving a betrothal.

But, because the companies neither need to register to a government department, nor have any industry regulations to abide by, there is no authority to settle disputes between the matchmakers and their clients.

International marriage brokerage companies usually take on Taiwanese clients who wish to marry women from Southeast Asian countries or China, and a contract costs between NT$10,000 to NT$350,000. The price of a contract depends on the spouses' nationalities, backgrounds and the company's charges.

According to statistics from the ministry, 90,069 foreign spouses from Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippine, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia and Singapore have arrived in Taiwan since 1987, while the Straits Exchange Foundation says that another 145,900 spouses have arrived from China during the same period of time.

There is no figure of how many matchmakers or marriage brokerage companies actually exist in Taiwan and the percentage of international marriages set up by the brokerage companies is also not clear.

Using a local search engine, a recent Internet search turned up no less than 87 international marriage brokerage Web sites

Wang Hong-jen (王宏仁), a sociologist at Chung Hsing University, who has studied Taiwanese' international marriages for long time, said "Regulating the industry is better than not doing so. What the government needs to so right now is to legalize the contract signing between Taiwanese and the marriage brokerage companies and regulate such matters through the Civil Code."

The ministry only started providing education for foreign brides at the end of 1999, after the passage of a bill by the Legislative Yuan.

Chien said yesterday that they will apply for the Judicial Yuan's reinterpretation of the adjudication in the coming days.