Vice President Chen Chien-jen (陳建仁) yesterday celebrated National Arbor Day by reiterating the nation’s commitment to reforestation and reducing greenhouse gas emissions, urging the public to join the government’s environmental conservation efforts.
Speaking at a tree-planting event in New Taipei City’s Cape Fuguei (富貴角), the northernmost point of Taiwan proper, Chen said climate change has caused damage and erosion in many coastal areas around the world, posing a severe threat to people’s lives and property.
“Particularly vulnerable is Taiwan, a country surrounded by the ocean which has a total coastline of 1,566km. In the face of climate change, we should step up our coastal areas’ defensive capability against monsoons and natural catastrophes,” Chen said.
In December 2015, the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change passed the Paris Agreement, which took effect in November last year and has been ratified by 72 nations worldwide, Chen said.
Chen said despite not being a UN member, Taiwan is still part of the global village and therefore needs to fulfill its obligations to the international community.
“To reach that goal, Taiwan has set a self-imposed target of achieving a 50 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. The more than 10,000 tree seedlings that are going to be planted in the nation’s protected forests are also part of our efforts,” he said.
Chen said that Taiwan, as a member of APEC, has also been trying to increase its forest area, which is in line with a target set forth in APEC’s 2007 Sydney Declaration to increase forest coverage in the region by at least 20 million hectares.
According to latest data, Taiwan has a total forest area of 2.197 million hectares that covers about 61 percent of the country’s surface, up from 58 percent two decades ago and representing an increase of about 80,000 hectares, Chen said.
“Though the results are remarkable, considering the pace of environmental destruction, I believe Taiwan can do more, better and faster,” he said.
The Taipei Department of Health yesterday said it has launched a probe into a restaurant at Far Eastern Sogo Xinyi A13 Department Store after a customer died of suspected food poisoning. A preliminary investigation on Sunday found missing employee health status reports and unsanitary kitchen utensils at Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) in the department store’s basement food court, the department said. No direct relationship between the food poisoning death and the restaurant was established, as no food from the day of the incident was available for testing and no other customers had reported health complaints, it said, adding that the investigation is ongoing. Later
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