It tops the list of the nation's most instantly recognizable songs, but starting next month Mariden's Prayer will have company.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has signed up Any Empty Bottles for Sale? (
In addition, a rock version of the 20-year-old local favorite, arranged by Harlem Yu (庾澄慶), will be played at hundreds of fast-food chain stores across the country starting from next Tuesday.
The two artists agreed to allow the EPA to use their work for free.
"It's my pleasure to do so," Hou said yesterday at a press conference organized by the EPA. "The level of civilization in a country can partly be judged by reviewing its achievements in environmental protection."
In 1983, Hou married a segment of a Taiwanese slogan commonly used by recycling service peddlers to a major pentatonic scale, the basic scale of Chinese music. The song turned out to be one of Hou's best-loved pieces. Over the past two decades, the song has been translated into a number of different languages, including French and Japanese.
EPA Administrator Hau Lung-bin (
Hau said the rock arrangement will be played at 600 fast-food chain stores, where more trash cans will be installed for customers to recycle leftovers and paper containers.
Hau said the 400 million customers visiting fast-food chain stores annually were the target of the EPA's environmental education program.
"The six-month trial will be an ideal model of the cooperation between the government, the industry and the public to practice recycling on a daily basis," Hau said.
Hau said the recycling push is part of a follow-up to the EPA's policy of limiting the use of plastic bags and disposable dinning tableware.
Beginning Jan. 1 next year, officials said, the trial will become a compulsory regulation for all fast-food chain stores.
According to Chen Hsiung-wen (
"Paper tableware will be sent to paper factories for pulping and leftovers will be used to produce fertilizers or pig feed," Chen said.
Officials said yesterday that this year the EPA is aiming to increase low recycling rates of used batteries, fluorescent lamps and paper tableware.
Taiwan has received more than US$70 million in royalties as of the end of last year from developing the F-16V jet as countries worldwide purchase or upgrade to this popular model, government and military officials said on Saturday. Taiwan funded the development of the F-16V jet and ended up the sole investor as other countries withdrew from the program. Now the F-16V is increasingly popular and countries must pay Taiwan a percentage in royalties when they purchase new F-16V aircraft or upgrade older F-16 models. The next five years are expected to be the peak for these royalties, with Taiwan potentially earning
STAY IN YOUR LANE: As the US and Israel attack Iran, the ministry has warned China not to overstep by including Taiwanese citizens in its evacuation orders The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday rebuked a statement by China’s embassy in Israel that it would evacuate Taiwanese holders of Chinese travel documents from Israel amid the latter’s escalating conflict with Iran. Tensions have risen across the Middle East in the wake of US and Israeli airstrikes on Iran beginning Saturday. China subsequently issued an evacuation notice for its citizens. In a news release, the Chinese embassy in Israel said holders of “Taiwan compatriot permits (台胞證)” issued to Taiwanese nationals by Chinese authorities for travel to China — could register for evacuation to Egypt. In Taipei, the ministry yesterday said Taiwan
Taiwan is awaiting official notification from the US regarding the status of the Agreement on Reciprocal Trade (ART) after the US Supreme Court ruled US President Donald Trump's global tariffs unconstitutional. Speaking to reporters before a legislative hearing today, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said that Taiwan's negotiation team remains focused on ensuring that the bilateral trade deal remains intact despite the legal challenge to Trump's tariff policy. "The US has pledged to notify its trade partners once the subsequent administrative and legal processes are finalized, and that certainly includes Taiwan," Cho said when asked about opposition parties’ doubts that the ART was
If China chose to invade Taiwan tomorrow, it would only have to sever three undersea fiber-optic cable clusters to cause a data blackout, Jason Hsu (許毓仁), a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislator, told a US security panel yesterday. In a Taiwan contingency, cable disruption would be one of the earliest preinvasion actions and the signal that escalation had begun, he said, adding that Taiwan’s current cable repair capabilities are insufficient. The US-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC) yesterday held a hearing on US-China Competition Under the Sea, with Hsu speaking on
RSS