Chen Wen-yu (陳文郁), supplier of nearly 25 percent of the world’s watermelon seeds, died on Dec. 7 at the age of 88.
A funeral service for Chen, who developed the world’s first seedless watermelon in 1962, is scheduled to be held tomorrow in Greater Kaohsiung.
Chen earned the name the “Watermelon King” because he produced more than 200 varieties of watermelons during his 44-plus years in the business.
Photo: Hsieh Wen-hua, Taipei Times
“My goal is to create the world’s most delicious watermelon,” he once said. “If you taste such a watermelon, you will not seek other watermelons.”
Born and raised in a rural village in Tainan’s Yongkang District (永康), Chen was very aware of the hardship farmers experienced and decided when he was 14 that he would study agricultural technology to help improve farmers’ lives.
With funding from the US Agency for International Development, he pursued advanced studies in horticulture at Chiba University in Japan. He later returned to Taiwan and founded the Kaohsiung-based Known-You Seed Co with his friends in 1968.
The name “Known-You” can be transliterated as “friends of farmers” in Mandarin.
Chen’s company focuses on developing new varieties of watermelon seeds, but has also created more than 500 new vegetable and flower varieties.
“It takes good seedlings to produce good varieties. We provide farmers with good seeds to help them reap better harvests,” he said.
These seeds “are provided to farmers in Taiwan and around the world,” the company said in a statement after Chen’s death.
The company has a seedling farm in the US and branch offices in China, India and several Southeast Asian countries such as Singapore and Thailand.
Chen also set up a foundation to help improve local farmers’ welfare and funded the establishment of a hospital in Myanmar to provide free medical services for farmers there.
In recognition of Chen’s contributions to agriculture and farmers’ welfare, President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) last year conferred on him the Order of Brilliant Star with Violet Grand Cordon.
Chen was also featured on the Discovery Channel in 2006 as one of six most influential Taiwanese.
Kenting National Park service technician Yang Jien-fon (楊政峰) won a silver award in World Grand Prix Photography Awards Spring Season for his photograph of two male rat snakes intertwined in combat. Yang’s colleagues at Kenting National Park said he is a master of nature photography who has been held back by his job in civil service. The awards accept entries in all four seasons across six categories: architectural and urban photography, black-and-white and fine art photography, commercial and fashion photography, documentary and people photography, nature and experimental photography, and mobile photography. Awards are ranked according to scores and divided into platinum, gold and
More than half of the bamboo vipers captured in Tainan in the past few years were found in the city’s Sinhua District (新化), while other districts had smaller catches or none at all. Every year, Tainan captures about 6,000 snakes which have made their way into people’s homes. Of the six major venomous snakes in Taiwan, the cobra, the many-banded krait, the brown-spotted pit viper and the bamboo viper are the most frequently captured. The high concentration of bamboo vipers captured in Sinhua District is puzzling. Tainan Agriculture Bureau Forestry and Nature Conservation Division head Chu Chien-ming (朱健明) earlier this week said that the
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus yesterday said it opposes the introduction of migrant workers from India until a mechanism is in place to prevent workers from absconding. Minister of Labor Hung Sun-han (洪申翰) on Thursday told the Legislative Yuan that the first group of migrant workers from India could be introduced as early as this year, as part of a government program. The caucus’ opposition to the policy is based on the assessment that “the risk is too high,” KMT caucus secretary-general Lin Pei-hsiang (林沛祥) said. Taiwan has a serious and long-standing problem of migrant workers absconding from their contracts, indicating that
SPACE VETERAN: Kjell N. Lindgren, who helps lead NASA’s human spaceflight missions, has been on two expeditions on the ISS and has spent 311 days in space Taiwan-born US astronaut Kjell N. Lindgren is to visit Taiwan to promote technological partnerships through one of the programs organized by the US for its 250th national anniversary. Lindgren would be in Taiwan from Tuesday to Saturday next week as part of the US Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs’ US Speaker Program, organized to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) said in a statement yesterday. Lindgren plans to engage with key leaders across the nation “to advance cutting-edge technological partnerships and inspire the next generation of scientists and engineers,”
RSS