Taipei is among five cities that have been climbing the rankings of the world’s most livable cities compiled annually by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) over the past decade, the British Broadcasting Corp (BBC) reported yesterday.
The other four are Honolulu, Budapest, Kuwait City and Auckland, the report said.
These “most livable cities” are ranked every year by the EIU, which rounds up 140 of the world’s biggest cities and ranks each one according to more than 30 factors that influence livability, including safety, access to healthcare, quality of food and drink options, access to education, and quality of roads and transportation.
Taipei ranked 58th in this year’s EIU Global Livability Ranking, up two places from last year.
The report attributed the continuing rise of Taipei in the livability rankings to the municipality continuing to invest in infrastructure and healthcare.
The Taipei MRT system extends to almost every area of the city, including the well-connected international airport, and residents praise the healthcare and education available — even to expatriates, the report said.
“The healthcare system is amazing,” the report quoted corporate adviser Shannon Watson, originally from Ottawa, as saying. “As expats, we can receive the same health coverage as citizens once we become an ‘alien resident’ [through work, family or school].”
“The health card covers seeing doctors that practice Western or traditional Chinese medicine, as well as dentists, and usually includes the medicine and treatment for a very small fee,” she added.
Families love the varied education opportunities available in this East Asian hub, the report said.
For instance, Judy Tsuei, who is originally from the US and is founder of media consultancy Wild Hearted Words, found a Montessori school for her daughter that also provides meals for students and teaches Mandarin, the report said.
The whole community looks out for children, making Taiwan ideal for young families.
“Although some level of Mandarin is important to get most jobs here, residents are friendly and eager to help foreigners, even when there is a language barrier,” the report quoted Tsuei as saying.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) yesterday voiced dissatisfaction with the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans- Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), whose latest meeting, concluded earlier the same day, appeared not to address the country’s application. In a statement, MOFA said the CPTPP commission had "once again failed to fairly process Taiwan’s application," attributing the inaction to the bloc’s "succumbing to political pressure," without elaborating. Taiwan submitted its CPTPP application under the name "Separate Customs Territory of Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu" on Sept. 22, 2021 -- less than a week after China
ALIGNED THINKING: Taiwan and Japan have a mutual interest in trade, culture and engineering, and can work together for stability, Cho Jung-tai said Taiwan and Japan are two like-minded countries willing to work together to form a “safety barrier” in the Indo-Pacific region, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) yesterday said at the opening ceremony of the 35th Taiwan-Japan Modern Engineering and Technology Symposium in Taipei. Taiwan and Japan are close geographically and closer emotionally, he added. Citing the overflowing of a barrier lake in the Mataian River (馬太鞍溪) in September, Cho said the submersible water level sensors given by Japan during the disaster helped Taiwan monitor the lake’s water levels more accurately. Japan also provided a lot of vaccines early in the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic,
THE GOOD WORD: More than 100 colleges on both sides of the Pacific will work together to bring students to Taiwan so they can learn Mandarin where it is spoken A total of 102 universities from Taiwan and the US are collaborating in a push to promote Taiwan as the first-choice place to learn Mandarin, with seven Mandarin learning centers stood up in the US to train and support teachers, the Foundation for International Cooperation in Higher Education of Taiwan (FICHET) said. At the annual convention of the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages held over the weekend in New Orleans, Louisiana, a Taiwan Pavilion was jointly run by 17 representative teams from the FICHET, the Overseas Community Affairs Council, the Steering Committee for the Test of Proficiency-Huayu, the
A home-style restaurant opened by a Taiwanese woman in Quezon City in Metro Manila has been featured in the first-ever Michelin Guide honoring exceptional restaurants in the Philippines. The restaurant, Fong Wei Wu (豐味屋), was one of 74 eateries to receive a “Michelin Selected” honor in the guide, while one restaurant received two Michelin stars, eight received one star and 25 were awarded a “Bib Gourmand.” The guide, which was limited to restaurants in Metro Manila and Cebu, was published on Oct. 30. In an interview, Feng Wei Wu’s owner and chef, Linda, said that as a restaurateur in her 60s, receiving an
RSS