Environmental Protection Admin-istrator Hau Lung-bin (
"We don't support a habit of using something only once," Hau said last week before the implementation of the policy
Last week, Hau came under fire as society debated the policy.
TAIPEI TIMES FILE PHOTO
On Dec. 31, the eve of the policy's implementation, Hau was facing challenges from representatives of plastics-industry workers and legislators from opposition parties at a public hearing at the legislature. An unemployed plastics-industry worker even kneeled down in front of Hau, asking for a job.
While inspecting restaurants and stores in downtown Taipei on Jan. 1 to monitor compliance, however, Hau was encouraged by a passersby who hoped the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) could stick to its plan of discouraging waste.
Facing criticism over the measures, Hau said that his resolution to carry out the policy had never wavered.
"I do have great sympathy for the affected workers of the plastics industry. But we have done our best to offer them as many job opportunities as we can," Hau told the Taipei Times.
According to the EPA, the Cabinet will spend about NT$1.58 billion this year on creating 8,400 jobs for laid-off plastics-industry workers.
Hau said that the public needs to be educated for the sake of Taiwan's sustainable development.
To deal with challenges from opposition lawmakers, Hau, the only Cabinet-level chief from the pro-unification New Party, spoke up last week at the legislature.
"We set up the policy because we love Taiwan," Hau said.
The first stage of the controversial policy was launched on July 1 last year, when all government-run stores were banned from providing free plastic shopping bags to customers. Three months later, a ban on disposable utensils and food containers was imposed at government-operated grocery stores and restaurants.
Beginning on Jan. 1, the second stage of the policy came into effect with the ban on free bags and utensils extended to department stores, supermarkets, fast-food restaurants, convenience stores and almost every type of retailer except street vendors. It is estimated that about 76,000 stores in the nation are effected.
Since early last year, when the EPA was planning details of the policy, Hau has been criticized by the plastics industry, which claims that the policy will eventually affect 50,000 workers.
Meanwhile, some environmental groups said that the EPA should have banned the use of all materials containing PVC, which produces dioxin during combustion.
Amid the controversy, Hau reiterated that the policy is aimed at changing consumers' habits and was not intended to harm the plastics industry.
One example often cited by EPA officials to illustrate the disadvantages of using plastic bags was the clogged drainage systems of Taipei City during the floods caused by Typhoon Nari in September 2001.
Hau even said that he would step down if the policy failed to reduce the amount of plastic waste.
According to the EPA, the first stage of the policy led to a drop in 90 percent of the amount of plastic bags consumed.
A survey by the Research, Development and Evaluation Commission last month named the EPA as the top Cabinet-level agency because of Hau's resolution and the positive results of the first stage of the policy.
Hau's positive image, however, was partly the result of a NT$30 million public-relations campaign.
Hau has seized every opportunity to educate the public.
"We can make a great contribution to environmental protection as long as we get used to the small inconvenience of carrying reusable bags when shopping," Hau told a crowd in downtown Taipei on Dec. 29.
Together with Pai Ping-ping (白冰冰), a TV entertainer who volunteered to promote the policy, Hau tore down several plastic bags and utensils attached to a huge model of the Earth to demonstrate his resolve to carry out the policy.
Hau and Pai also played roles in TV commercials as environmental police attacking the pollution caused by the use of plastic materials.
One week before the second stage of the policy was implemented, Hau wrote a 3,000 word letter to EPA staff, asking members to write the history of environmental protection in Taiwan.
"Obviously, the policy of tackling environmental problems resulting from the use of plastic bags has become a citizens' movement for environmental protection," said Yuan Shaw-ying (袁紹英), head of the EPA's public-relations office.
Hau has called the policy "a revolution in living."
The policy was welcomed by some environmental groups, which believe that less consumption of plastic materials will help improve the environment.
Some groups, however, said they are worried about other materials being used to replace disposable plastic items.
"If paper substitutes are readily available, I don't think people will lose the habit of using something only once," said Lai Wei-chieh (
Three days after the implementation of the new policy, Lai said that he saw a noodle dish in a chain store being wrapped in seven layers of paper.
In addition, Lai said, the implementation of the policy put the burden of looking after unemployed plastics-industry workers on the government's shoulders, even though the industry is in decline.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching