Many migrant fishers live in tiny, unclean spaces with no showers, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Jason Hsu (許毓仁) and the Yilan Migrant Fishermen Union said yesterday, calling on the Ministry of Labor and the Fisheries Agency to improve their work conditions.
Union secretary-general Allison Lee (李麗華) said that on a recent visit to a fishing boat together with Hsu, she found that the migrant fishers lived in extremely cramped spaces.
“I could not believe what I saw. It could not even meet a person’s most basic needs,” Lee said.
Photo: Huang Yao-cheng, Taipei Times
The toilet stall was so small that users could not stand up and there was no shower or hot water, she said.
“Many boats do not have any showers or toilets. So when crew members need to take a shower, they just go to the deck and scoop up water from the sea or use tap water at harbors,” she said.
“I do not believe that anyone would like taking a shower in public, not to mention that there is no hot water in the winter,” she said.
While there are shower facilities at local fishers’ activity centers in Keelung, and Yilan and Penghu counties, which they would be able to use between fishing trips, local associations require that migrant fishers pay for their use, she said.
“Why would migrant workers have to figure that out on their own? Their employers should arrange that for them,” she said, urging the agency to intervene.
Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Chen Man-li (陳曼麗) said that she was particularly concerned about the safety of migrant workers on typhoon days, when they are often required to stay on their boats, which are moored.
The agency and the ministry should take measures to improve migrant fishers’ work conditions and living environments, Hsu said.
They should also step up labor inspections of fishing boats and clarify their responsibilities in areas where overlaps occur to avoid inefficiency due to confusion, he added.
The US Department of State has urged Taiwan to better protect migrant fishers’ human rights for five consecutive years in its annual Trafficking in Persons report, Hsu said.
The EU has threatened to impose sanctions on Taiwan within a month if no improvement is made, he said
“It is very embarrassing that this is happening in Taiwan,” Hsu added.
About 20,000 registered migrant fishers work offshore and the agency has 130 inspectors who visit their fishing boats for regular and unscheduled inspections, Fisheries Agency Director-General Huang Hung-yan (黃鴻燕) said.
While small fishing boats tend to offer poor living conditions, the agency has offered incentives for boat owners to replace their vessels with newer ones, he said, adding that employers should pay for migrant fishers’ use of shower facilities.
Labor laws apply to migrant fishers when they work onshore and the Workforce Development Agency would enforce the law if any employer or employment agency is found in breach, Workforce Development Agency Deputy Director-General Tsai Meng-liang (蔡孟良) added.
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
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
Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chi-mai (陳其邁) on Monday announced light shows and themed traffic lights to welcome fans of South Korean pop group Twice to the port city. The group is to play Kaohsiung on Saturday as part of its “This Is For” world tour. It would be the group’s first performance in Taiwan since its debut 10 years ago. The all-female group consists of five South Koreans, three Japanese and Tainan’s Chou Tzu-yu (周子瑜), the first Taiwan-born and raised member of a South Korean girl group. To promote the group’s arrival, the city has been holding a series of events, including a pop-up
RSS