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Fifth farmer's death triggers complaints over farming policy

A 73-year-old female farmer died in her field in Hsinkang Township (新港鄉), Chiayi County, on Saturday, becoming the fifth farmer to have died at work this summer.

A medical examiner had said the woman might have fainted after working outdoors in the midday sun and then died from heat exhaustion after laying unnoticed for a long time.

Two activists from the Taiwan Farmers Alliance told a press conference in Taipei yesterday that the five farmers had been killed by the government's agriculture policy.

`HEARTBREAKING'

"It's such a heartbreaking thing to know that elderly farmers are dying from the heat in the fields to which they have devoted their whole lives," Lin Shan-chin (林深靖) said.

Lin said he had asked his children to telephone his parents, who are in their 70s, every day because they are also working on farms in Hsinkang.

How many more farmers had to die before the government's would pay attention to its "very bad agriculture policy," he said.

He criticized the government for not being able to develop policies to boost agriculture development and simply increasing monthly stipend for elderly farmers at election time.

Monthly pensions for farmers were raised from the initial NT$3,000 to NT$4,000 in January 2004, three months ahead of last presidential election.

The pension was increased by NT$1,000 before 2005's three-in-one election.

Lawmakers across party lines submitted proposals in the just-concluded legislative session to raise the pension to NT$6,000. None of the proposals have been passed yet.

Lin said that without a sound agriculture policy, the monthly stipend seemed to be "white envelopes" for elderly farmers, referring to the money given to the bereaved family at a funeral.

Alliance chairman Su Wei-shuo (蘇偉碩) said the farmers died because the government had long ago washed its hands of agriculture.

"They were not killed by the relentless sun," he said.

FIGURES CITED

Citing a study by the Council of Agriculture, Su said that the number of agricultural workers had declined from 740,000 in 2000 to 530,000 as of May -- a loss of 203,000 people.

He said 49.9 percent of the remaining workers are older than 55 and 18.4 percent are older than 65.

The study also showed that the average annual agricultural income of a farming family in 2005 was less than NT$180,000, Su said.

"Aren't elderly farmers supposed to enjoy their families at their ages?" Su said.

"Why do they have to work at such risk to their own lives? Because they are not able to feed their families with such limited income," he said.

The press conference was sponsored by Taiwan Solidarity Union Legislator Lai Shin-yuan (賴幸媛), who said that the government has been ignoring the agricultural sector.

Lai said this was evident because the percentage of agriculture sector contribution to GDP had dropped from 4 percent in 2000 to 1.5 percent this year.
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