Indonesia has become the fifth-largest source of international students in Taiwan, with the number more than doubling over the past 10 years, the Ministry of Education (MOE) said yesterday.
There are 4,931 Indonesian students now in Taiwan, two-and-half times the number in 2008, Department of International and Cross-strait Education Bi Cheu-an (畢祖安) said in a speech at the Taiwan-Indonesia Higher Education Forum in Taipei.
Taiwan has been strengthening its higher-education exchanges with Indonesia, one of its key partners under the New Southbound Policy, as evidenced by about 800 cooperation agreements signed by universities in the two nations, Bi said.
Indonesia is planning to send more students to Taiwan to study subjects that meet its development needs, said Paulina Pannen, a senior adviser on academics at the Indonesian Ministry of Research, Technology and Higher Education.
Pannen is leading the Indonesian delegation to the forum, which has drawn 193 participants from government agencies and universities in both nations.
The Indonesian government has provided funding for its nationals to study in Taiwan, Germany, Austria, and New Zealand since 2012, the MOE said.
Those coming to Taiwan mainly focus on business management and engineering, the MOE 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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