Agriculture
Tea growers profits soar
Tea growers have seen profits nearly double since last year as the result of a government-sponsored program that promotes the growth of high-quality leaves, a Council of Agriculture official said. Since late last year, the council has provided consulting and advanced techniques for applying fertilizer or medicine, helping high-end tea growers obtain certification including ISO 22000 and HACCP, said Tsai Hsien-tsung (蔡憲宗), director of the Tea Research and Extention Station’s Wenshan Branch. Taiwanese tea has become more competitive against foreign teas, Tsai said, noting that Starbucks Beijing and European tea merchants have placed orders. Tea growers in areas such as Taipei County’s Pinglin (坪林) and Sansia (三峽) townships, Taoyuan County and Hsinchu County have seen profits rise, he said.
Tourism
Event promotes local snacks
Government Information Office (GIO) Minister Johnny Chiang (江啟臣) will host a prize draw and tasting event today to kickoff activities to promote selected snacks overseas. According to the GIO, in a recent contest to promote Taiwanese cuisine, the public selected stinky tofu, oyster omelet, braised meat rice and bubble tea as most representative of the nation’s tastes and flavors. A total of 8,117 people voted online to select the four most representative snacks among four groupings — stinky tofu vs pork blood cake, oyster omelet vs Taiwan meat ball, mini steam bun vs braised meat rice and bubble tea vs mango shredded ice.
Environment
LED system set for launch
An intelligent-control system for LED lighting will be launched today in Taipei County as part of an effort to promote green energy. The Ministry of Economic Affairs said it had invested NT$18 million (US$586,800) to install more than 500 intelligent LED street lamps in three major parking lots in Sanchong City (三重), with the aim of cutting electricity consumption by at least 70 percent. The total electricity saving would be equivalent to almost nine times the electricity generated annually by the Feitsui Reservoir (翡翠水庫), the ministry predicted. “The intelligent system will adjust the intensity of the lights by detecting the level of usage, such as the presence of pedestrians or vehicles, and thus reduce electricity consumption,” the officials said. Ordinary LED street lamps already save around 50 percent to 60 percent of electricity, and those connected to the intelligent system would save 20 percent more, the officials said.
Industry
Toys found to be toxic
Nearly 21 percent of locally sold toys tested in a recent survey contained an excessive level of plasticizers and 15 percent lacked the proper labeling, according to the Bureau of Standards, Metrology, and Inspection. Of 52 items tested, including bathtub toys and inflatables, 11 contained a level of phthalate ester that exceeded the national standard of 0.1 percent of a toy’s weight, Deputy Director-General Huang Lai-ho (黃來和) said. The amount of plasticizer in the 11 products found to be substandard ranged from 0.14 percent to 38.79 percent, according to the bureau’s test results. The bureau said it ordered the manufacturers of the defective items to recall them within a set timeframe or face fines ranging from NT$100,000 to NT$1 million. Plasticizers are additives used in plastic products to increase their flexibility or plasticity.
FLU SEASON: Twenty-six severe cases were reported from Tuesday last week to Monday, including a seven-year-old girl diagnosed with influenza-associated encephalopathy Nearly 140,000 people sought medical assistance for diarrhea last week, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said on Tuesday. From April 7 to Saturday last week, 139,848 people sought medical help for diarrhea-related illness, a 15.7 percent increase from last week’s 120,868 reports, CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said. The number of people who reported diarrhea-related illness last week was the fourth highest in the same time period over the past decade, Lee said. Over the past four weeks, 203 mass illness cases had been reported, nearly four times higher than the 54 cases documented in the same period
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