The Cabinet is considering allowing corporations and private foundations to adopt sensitive mountainous areas and purchase farmland for land conservation in geologically sensitive areas.
"We're thinking of adopting the UK model to allow a privately-funded foundation to buy or adopt fruit or vegetable farms located in mountainous areas," Minister Without Portfolio Lin Sheng-feng (
The private-sector buyer would be required to abide by the law the Cabinet is drafting and hopes will pass the legislature this year. This law will reduce or outlaw land development in mountainous, coastal and flood-prone areas, and would recommend NT$100 billion in spending over the next 10 years on land restoration projects. The bill would offer incentives to residents of those areas to relocate or to sell their land, whose total value is estimated at between NT$5 billion and NT$6 billion.
The Shihmen Dam watershed covers more than 763km3 and includes seven townships and villages. About 94 percent of the area is either Aboriginal or national forestry reserves.
The watershed's fruit farms total 2,015 hectares, and their number has increased 44.6 percent between 1976 and 1998. About 870 hectares are located on steep hillsides where farming is banned.
Lin spoke after briefing Premier Yu Shyi-kun about the reasons water service in Taoyuan County was suspended and how these problems can be resolved.
Currently, five government agencies manage Shihmen Dam. The Cabinet proposed a committee be formed to take charge of these issues under the proposed environmental resources ministry after the legislature passes draft amendments to the Executive Yuan's organic law. Because recent severe storms filled the reservoir behind Shihmen Dam with silt and debris, water service for Taoyuan County was suspended for weeks.
Both natural and human factors caused the problems, Lin said. Natural factors included heavy rainfall and fragile geological features. Human factors included unwise farming and unstable roads in mountain areas and improper dumping of road-construction debris.
"The trigger factor was the heavy rainfall, which caused the collapse of 368 hectares of land upstream from the Shihmen Dam," Lin said. "This land collapse dumped more than 40,000 tonnes of driftwood and more than 20 million cubic meters of silt into the reservoir, making the water so turbid that the county's four water treatment plants had to shut down for days and 600,000 families were left without water," he said.
The loss of water service cost the county's industries NT$4.81 billion and additional commercial losses were estimated at NT$110 million.
A Taiwanese woman on Sunday was injured by a small piece of masonry that fell from the dome of St Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican during a visit to the church. The tourist, identified as Hsu Yun-chen (許芸禎), was struck on the forehead while she and her tour group were near Michelangelo’s sculpture Pieta. Hsu was rushed to a hospital, the group’s guide to the church, Fu Jing, said yesterday. Hsu was found not to have serious injuries and was able to continue her tour as scheduled, Fu added. Mathew Lee (李世明), Taiwan’s recently retired ambassador to the Holy See, said he met
A BETRAYAL? It is none of the ministry’s business if those entertainers love China, but ‘you cannot agree to wipe out your own country,’ the MAC minister said Taiwanese entertainers in China would have their Taiwanese citizenship revoked if they are holding Chinese citizenship, Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said. Several Taiwanese entertainers, including Patty Hou (侯佩岑) and Ouyang Nana (歐陽娜娜), earlier this month on their Weibo (微博) accounts shared a picture saying that Taiwan would be “returned” to China, with tags such as “Taiwan, Province of China” or “Adhere to the ‘one China’ principle.” The MAC would investigate whether those Taiwanese entertainers have Chinese IDs and added that it would revoke their Taiwanese citizenship if they did, Chiu told the Chinese-language Liberty Times (sister paper
The Chinese wife of a Taiwanese, surnamed Liu (劉), who openly advocated for China’s use of force against Taiwan, would be forcibly deported according to the law if she has not left Taiwan by Friday, National Immigration Agency (NIA) officials said yesterday. Liu, an influencer better known by her online channel name Yaya in Taiwan (亞亞在台灣), obtained permanent residency via marriage to a Taiwanese. She has been reported for allegedly repeatedly espousing pro-unification comments on her YouTube and TikTok channels, including comments supporting China’s unification with Taiwan by force and the Chinese government’s stance that “Taiwan is an inseparable part of China.” Liu
FATE UNKNOWN: The owner of the dog could face a fine of up to NT$150,000 and the animal could be euthanized if he cannot show that he can effectively supervise it A pit bull terrier has been confiscated by authorities after it yesterday morning bit a motorcyclist in Taipei, following footage of the same dog in a similar attack going viral online earlier this month. When the owner, surnamed Hsu (徐), stopped at a red light on Daan District’s (大安) Wolong Street at 8am, the dog, named “Lucky,” allegedly rolled down the automatic window of the pickup truck they were riding in, leapt out of the rear passenger window and attacked a motorcyclist behind them, Taipei’s Daan District Police Precinct said. The dog clamped down on the man’s leg and only let go
RSS