With less than three months to go before a ban against slaughtering live poultry in traditional markets goes into effect, the policy change is gathering opposition from poultry farmers who say their livelihoods are threatened by the move.
Cages full of live chickens continue to be stacked up in traditional markets all over the country. Customers can pick the chicken they want from the cages as they have always been able to do, but all that is set to change on April 1.
Poultry industry representatives say that the ban will devastate chicken farmers and sellers, especially purveyors of specialty varieties of chicken most identifiable by their feathers.
"All over the world, communities of Chinese heritage prefer to eat freshly-killed chicken," said a representative of the Poultry Association who wished to remain unnamed because of ongoing negotiations with the Council of Agriculture. "You cannot change that preference."
"We have black-boned chickens, pearl chickens, black feathered and red feathered wild chickens. All these varieties fetch higher prices at the market, but if you strip the plumage from the birds, you are also stripping the consumer's means of visually identifying the variety," said the representative.
In a Council of Agriculture press conference on the issue several months ago, public health experts said the ban is a necessary measure to prevent the spread of bird flu.
"Taiwan is living in the bird flu danger zone," said Chen Chien-jen (
"Hong Kong was actually hit with bird flu in 1997, but they did not choose to ban live chickens in traditional markets," rebutted the representative. "Instead, they are installing safety precautions such as screens that separate the consumers from the birds."
An official who wished to remain unnamed at the council's Bureau of Animal and Plant Health Inspection and Quarantine said that the rule changes are scheduled to go ahead as planned.
"We not only need to prevent physical contact between the live birds and the consumers but to make sure they are not breathing the same air," said the official.
Taiwan would benefit from more integrated military strategies and deployments if the US and its allies treat the East China Sea, the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea as a “single theater of operations,” a Taiwanese military expert said yesterday. Shen Ming-shih (沈明室), a researcher at the Institute for National Defense and Security Research, said he made the assessment after two Japanese military experts warned of emerging threats from China based on a drill conducted this month by the Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) Eastern Theater Command. Japan Institute for National Fundamentals researcher Maki Nakagawa said the drill differed from the
‘WORSE THAN COMMUNISTS’: President William Lai has cracked down on his political enemies and has attempted to exterminate all opposition forces, the chairman said The legislature would motion for a presidential recall after May 20, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) said yesterday at a protest themed “against green communists and dictatorship” in Taipei. Taiwan is supposed to be a peaceful homeland where people are united, but President William Lai (賴清德) has been polarizing and tearing apart society since his inauguration, Chu said. Lai must show his commitment to his job, otherwise a referendum could be initiated to recall him, he said. Democracy means the rule of the people, not the rule of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), but Lai has failed to fulfill his
A rally held by opposition parties yesterday demonstrates that Taiwan is a democratic country, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday, adding that if opposition parties really want to fight dictatorship, they should fight it on Tiananmen Square in Beijing. The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) held a protest with the theme “against green communists and dictatorship,” and was joined by the Taiwan People’s Party. Lai said the opposition parties are against what they called the “green communists,” but do not fight against the “Chinese communists,” adding that if they really want to fight dictatorship, they should go to the right place and face
A 79-year-old woman died today after being struck by a train at a level crossing in Taoyuan, police said. The woman, identified by her surname Wang (王), crossed the tracks even though the barriers were down in Jhongli District’s (中壢) Neili (內壢) area, the Taoyuan Branch of the Railway Police Bureau said. Surveillance footage showed that the railway barriers were lowered when Wang entered the crossing, but why she ventured onto the track remains under investigation, the police said. Police said they received a report of an incident at 6:41am involving local train No. 2133 that was heading from Keelung to Chiayi City. Investigators
RSS