■ AGRICULTURE
Organic farms expanding
Organic farms are expected to represent 5,000 hectares, or 0.6 percent, of the country’s total agricultural land by 2012, Agriculture and Food Agency Director-General Chen Wen-deh (陳文德) said. The area for organic farming totaled 2,300 hectares at the end of 2008 and amounted to 2,960 hectares by the end of last year. As of last month, nearly 1,399 households were involved in organic farming and 3,150 hectares, or about 0.38 percent of total farmland, was dedicated to organic crops, agency statistics showed. The Council of Agriculture has accredited 13 non-governmental groups as organic product certification organizations. This year, labeling checks will be conducted on 3,000 organic products and quality inspections on 1,800 organic items, Chen said.
■ DIPLOMACY
Canadian group lauds Ma
The Canada-Taiwan Parliamentary Friendship Group on May 3 sent a note of congratulation to President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) upon the second anniversary of his inauguration and commended him for “easing cross-strait tensions,” the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said yesterday. Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development John Duncan, who serves as president of the group, said in the letter they were aware of the economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) the Ma administration intends to sign with China, adding that it had taken note of a televised debate on April 25 on the topic between Ma and Democratic Progressive Party Chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文). “It is clear from the post-debate polling and articles that you gave a strong performance. A successfully concluded ECFA will be good for Taiwan, good for cross-strait relations and good for the international harmony and fiscal relations,” the letter said, providing assurances that the group would continue supporting Taiwan’s participation in international organizations.
■ SAFETY
Number of fires drops
The number of fires and people killed or injured as a result of fires dropped in the first quarter compared with the same period last year, the Ministry of the Interior said yesterday. In the period from January to March, 95 people either died or were injured in fires, the ministry said, a 9.5 percent decrease year-on-year. There were also fewer fires — 676 compared with 821 in the first quarter of last year — a 17.7 percent decrease, ministry statistics showed.
■ TRANSPORTATION
Passenger makes gun claim
A passenger on board a China Airlines (CAL) flight bound for Los Angeles on Friday claimed to have a gun in his luggage and was taken away by US authorities for questioning after the plane landed, the airline said yesterday. CAL spokesman Chen Peng-yu (陳鵬宇) said the passenger, surnamed Yang (楊), told a flight attendant about 90 minutes prior to landing that there was a gun in his luggage. The flight attendant immediately reported the situation to the pilot. Yang later said he made the claim because he was curious about how the airline would handle such a situation. The passenger’s behavior and remarks threatened flight safety, Chen said, adding that the airline would consider asking Yang for compensation. On Saturday last week, a CAL flight from Taipei to Shanghai was forced to make an emergency landing in Hangzhou after a passenger claimed to have a bomb in his luggage. He later said the comment was a joke.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater