With the Taipei International Flora Expo concluding in late April, Taipei City Councilor Wang Shih-chien (王世堅) said the event’s financial impact and ability to draw tourists were failing to match Taipei City Government’s promises.
“When President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) said the expo was an international event that would attract money from foreign tourists, it was all lies,” Wang said.
“Since the expo started in November, most foreign visitors who have come to Taiwan chose to go to the National Palace Museum over the flora expo,” Wang said.
Statistics from the expo’s main office show that of the total number of people who visited the expo, only 6.3 percent were -foreign visitors.
Of that number, half were from Japan, while Chinese accounted for the other half.
“The Taipei government spent a lot of money on this ‘international’ exposition — one that is domestic instead,” Wang said.
“The city government spent more than NT$130 billion [US$4.4 billion] in government funds on the expo. While NT$4 billion was spent on advertisement, only NT$3.6 million was set aside for international advertising,” Wang said.
“With only two months left, the 8 million visitor mark set by Ma and Hau is unlikely to be met,” he added.
“The flora expo’s minimum forecast of 400,000 foreign visitors does not mesh with the goal of boosting the economy,” Wang said.
Starlux Airlines, Taiwan’s newest international carrier, has announced it would apply to join the Oneworld global airline alliance before the end of next year. In an investor conference on Monday, Starlux Airlines chief executive officer Glenn Chai (翟健華) said joining the alliance would help it access Taiwan. Chai said that if accepted, Starlux would work with other airlines in the alliance on flight schedules, passenger transits and frequent flyer programs. The Oneworld alliance has 13 members, including American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific and Qantas, and serves more than 900 destinations in 170 territories. Joining Oneworld would also help boost
A new tropical storm formed late yesterday near Guam and is to approach closest to Taiwan on Thursday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. Tropical Storm Pulasan became the 14th named storm of the year at 9:25pm yesterday, the agency said. As of 8am today, it was near Guam traveling northwest at 21kph, it said. The storm’s structure is relatively loose and conditions for strengthening are limited, WeatherRisk analyst Wu Sheng-yu (吳聖宇) said on Facebook. Its path is likely to be similar to Typhoon Bebinca, which passed north of Taiwan over Japan’s Ryukyu Islands and made landfall in Shanghai this morning, he said. However, it
Taiwan's Gold Apollo Co (金阿波羅通信) said today that the pagers used in detonations in Lebanon the day before were not made by it, but by a company called BAC which has a license to use its brand. At least nine people were killed and nearly 3,000 wounded when pagers used by Hezbollah members detonated simultaneously across Lebanon yesterday. Images of destroyed pagers analyzed by Reuters showed a format and stickers on the back that were consistent with pagers made by Gold Apollo. A senior Lebanese security source told Reuters that Hezbollah had ordered 5,000 pagers from Taiwan-based Gold Apollo. "The product was not
COLD FACTS: ‘Snow skin’ mooncakes, made with a glutinous rice skin and kept at a low temperature, have relatively few calories compared with other mooncakes Traditional mooncakes are a typical treat for many Taiwanese in the lead-up to the Mid-Autumn Festival, but a Taipei-based dietitian has urged people not to eat more than one per day and not to have them every day due to their high fat and calorie content. As mooncakes contain a lot of oil and sugar, they can have negative health effects on older people and those with diabetes, said Lai Yu-han (賴俞含), a dietitian at Taipei Hospital of the Ministry of Health and Welfare. “The maximum you can have is one mooncake a day, and do not eat them every day,” Lai