A local women’s environmental protection group yesterday celebrated its decades-long efforts to help change stereotypes about housewives.
In 1987, a group of housewives decided to walk out of the kitchen to play a part in social activities through the creation of the Homemakers United Foundation.
Over the years, the foundation has initiated a series of actions to protect the environment.
These actions have included advocating waste sortage, promoting recycling, opposing nuclear power and paying close attention to food safety and forest conservation.
By voicing their opinions and taking action, housewives can contribute to society, foundation president Chen Man-li (陳曼麗) said at a celebration to mark the foundation’s 25th anniversary.
The foundation is currently focusing on issues such as US beef imports that contain ractopamine and creating an environment free of nuclear power, Chen said.
“We’re not opposed to imports of US beef,” Chen said. “However, because of safety concerns, we object to the import of beef containing ractopamine from the US.”
Ractopamine is a leanness--enhancing additive that is allowed in livestock feed in more than 20 countries, such as the US, but is banned in Taiwan, China and the EU.
The Taiwanese government has been under pressure from Washington and is considering whether to lift its ban on the use of ractopamine and allow the local sale of meat containing traces of the drug.
Amid speculation that the government is leaning toward lifting the ban, several local groups, including the foundation, have staged several protests against the use of ractopamine.
However, the government has reiterated that it has no predetermined stance on the issue and would make its decision based on professional opinions and risk control evaluations.
The foundation also plans to participate in a nationwide demonstration against nuclear energy on Sunday, the first anniversary of Japan’s devastating earthquake and ensuing tsunami that resulted in a nuclear crisis in the country, Chen said.
As part of its anniversary event, the foundation is also holding a photograph exhibition at the Taipei Water Park to showcase its efforts to create a better, sustainable environment for Taiwan.
The exhibition will run through March 31.
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