The Ministry of National Defense has announced a draft revision to regulations on body standards for active-duty and reserve-duty recruits and conscripts, aimed at increasing the number of eligible recruits.
National Conscription Agency Deputy Director Shen Che-fang (沈哲芳) on Saturday said that his agency had determined that the requirements could be “more reasonable” and suggested the amendment to the ministry.
The draft revision was published on Thursday, and as long as no issues arise during the 60-day public feedback and suggestion period, it would be submitted to legislators for review.
Photo: Ann Wang, Reuters
The revision would relax the body mass index (BMI) standards for recruits.
Under current regulations, men of service age can be exempted from service if they are taller than 195cm or shorter than 158cm.
The amendment would include people taller than 155cm. Those between 155cm and 158cm would not be eligible for active duty, but would still be called up for conscription, and would be required to perform alternative service.
However, an exemption would be made for those in this height category whose BMI is less than 15 or more than 35.
Under current regulations, conscripts who are between 158cm and 195cm tall are eligible for alternative service if their BMI is less than 16.5 or more than 31. Under the proposed changes, only those in the height range with a BMI of less than 15 or more than 32 would be eligible for alternative service.
At present, those with a corrected visual acuity of less than 0.1 in one eye, a measurement of 11 diopters in one eye while the pupil is dilated, or a difference of five diopters measured between both eyes can be exempted from service.
However, under the new rules, draftees with a diopter of more than 11 in one eye and a difference of five diopters between both eyes would be exempted from service only if their “best-corrected visual acuity does not reach 0.6.”
Su Tzu-yun (蘇紫雲), a research fellow at the Institute for National Defense and Security Research, yesterday said that the proposed standards are more relaxed than in the US, but similar to Singapore’s.
Countries with conscription tend to have more relaxed standards to meet recruitment needs, he added.
The standards have been revised 16 times since they were first issued in 1974, with the last revision issued in 2018.
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