To reduce consumption of disposable cups, the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) said it is preparing incentives to promote the use of reusable containers.
The nation’s beverage stores use about 1.5 billion plastic or polystyrene cups every year, putting a heavy burden on the environment.
Plastic accounts for 90 percent of ocean waste, with bottles, bottle caps, straws, bags and cups constituting the top five types, Society of Wilderness data from last year show.
After Tainan prohibited the use of polystyrene cups in 2012, the amount found in the ocean significantly decreased, a survey by the society found.
Although the EPA offers incentives for recycling plastic bottles and next year is to expand its regulations on plastic bags, it has not yet proposed any regulations regarding plastic cups.
The agency said it plans to encourage the use of reusable cups by offering incentives such as discounts, but added that the policy is still under evaluation.
In other developments, several non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are urging the EPA to next year release a timetable for reducing plastic waste.
The appeal came in the wake of several reports of significant marine pollution.
A few days ago, garbage was found at Shajhu Bay (沙珠灣) in New Taipei City’s Jinshan District (金山), tarnishing the attractive surfing venue, while the Fenniaolin Fishing Port (粉鳥林漁港) in Yilan County’s Suao Township (蘇澳) was closed in August after being overwhelmed by visitors and trash.
To curb such pollution, the EPA and several NGOs in July established a platform for managing ocean waste.
It is the nation’s first platform devoted to marine waste issues that connects the government and NGOs, Greenpeace Taiwan said, adding that it has so far convened three meetings to discuss ways to reduce garbage from the source, effective management and monitoring, research and international interaction.
However, the EPA should still launch a timetable for reducing plastic products next year, the NGOs said.
The EPA is integrating its water quality, waste management and sanitation departments to address the issue, EPA Deputy Minister Chan Shun-kuei (詹順貴) said.
The Executive Yuan values the platform and will coordinate between various ministries, he said, adding that the determination to reduce marine waste reaches the Cabinet level.
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
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
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