The Cabinet yesterday passed a proposal aimed at boosting creative industries.
Officials hope the proposal will increase the output value of the two sectors to more than NT$1 trillion (US$30 billion), while creating more than 200,000 jobs within four years.
Council for Cultural Affairs official Fang Jy-shiuh (方芷絮) told a press conference that the government would invest NT$27.5 billion in four years, on top of venture capital of NT$20 billion, in creative industries during the period.
She said the council hoped to turn TV programs, films, popular music, digital content, design and crafts into flagship industries.
Premier Liu Chao-shiuan (劉兆玄) was quoted in a press statement as saying that he hoped to see a draft bill that would provide tax incentives to businesses developing the industry clear the legislature as soon as possible.
Government Information Office (GIO) Minister Su Jun-pin (蘇俊賓) told the press conference that the government would allow businesses producing TV programs to work with their counterparts in China to produce prime-time TV in China.
A GIO official said that the initiative could be implemented as early as next month and was expected to create 400 jobs for local entertainers within a year.
Meanwhile, the Cabinet passed a draft bill to cultivate awareness of environmental protection and improve public participation in environmental protection.
Under the bill, public bodies, schools, government-funded foundations and private businesses that reach a certain scale would be required to organize classes on subjects related to environmental protection for personnel of no less than four hours each year.
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods