After Formosa Television (FTV) secured government approval to coproduce a TV series with a Chinese company, the National Communications Commission (NCC) said yesterday that a series would be considered “made in China” if more than one-third of the cast and crew are Chinese.
Chien Hsu-cheng (簡旭徵), deputy director of the NCC’s Communication Content Department, said that a regulation promulgated by the Ministry of Economic Affairs and the Ministry of Finance last week stipulated criteria for determining the origin of a radio or TV program.
LOCAL CONTENT
The Broadcasting and Television Act (廣播電視法) stipulates that at least 70 percent of programs aired on a terrestrial TV station must be produced in Taiwan.
“If the program has main and supporting actors of a certain country exceeding one-third of the total cast; or if the producers, directors and screenwriters of that country also [make up] the same percentage, it will be considered a production of that country,” Chien said.
The NCC released the statement after the Chinese-language China Times yesterday reported that FTV had coproduced a TV series with a company in Xiamen, Fujian Province.
STARTING WORK
Some of the actors, including Hong Kong actor Adam Cheng (鄭少秋) and other Chinese actors, arrived on Tuesday to begin shooting.
FTV was quoted in the story as saying it had decided to coproduce the series with the Xiamen company because the cultures of Taiwan and Fujian Province have many similarities.
FTV has produced popular series such as Mom’s House (娘家) in Taiwan. Its network offers terrestrial TV service and cable TV service.
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) today issued a sea warning for Typhoon Fung-wong effective from 5:30pm, while local governments canceled school and work for tomorrow. A land warning is expected to be issued tomorrow morning before it is expected to make landfall on Wednesday, the agency said. Taoyuan, and well as Yilan, Hualien and Penghu counties canceled work and school for tomorrow, as well as mountainous district of Taipei and New Taipei City. For updated information on closures, please visit the Directorate-General of Personnel Administration Web site. As of 5pm today, Fung-wong was about 490km south-southwest of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan's southernmost point.
UNILATERAL MOVES: Officials have raised concerns that Beijing could try to exert economic control over Kinmen in a key development plan next year The Civil Aviation Administration (CAA) yesterday said that China has so far failed to provide any information about a new airport expected to open next year that is less than 10km from a Taiwanese airport, raising flight safety concerns. Xiamen Xiangan International Airport is only about 3km at its closest point from the islands in Kinmen County — the scene of on-off fighting during the Cold War — and construction work can be seen and heard clearly from the Taiwan side. In a written statement sent to Reuters, the CAA said that airports close to each other need detailed advanced
Tropical Storm Fung-Wong would likely strengthen into a typhoon later today as it continues moving westward across the Pacific before heading in Taiwan’s direction next week, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 8am, Fung-Wong was about 2,190km east-southeast of Cape Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan’s southernmost point, moving westward at 25kph and possibly accelerating to 31kph, CWA data showed. The tropical storm is currently over waters east of the Philippines and still far from Taiwan, CWA forecaster Tseng Chao-cheng (曾昭誠) said, adding that it could likely strengthen into a typhoon later in the day. It is forecast to reach the South China Sea
Almost a quarter of volunteer soldiers who signed up from 2021 to last year have sought early discharge, the Legislative Yuan’s Budget Center said in a report. The report said that 12,884 of 52,674 people who volunteered in the period had sought an early exit from the military, returning NT$895.96 million (US$28.86 million) to the government. In 2021, there was a 105.34 percent rise in the volunteer recruitment rate, but the number has steadily declined since then, missing recruitment targets, the Chinese-language United Daily News said, citing the report. In 2021, only 521 volunteers dropped out of the military, the report said, citing