The Ministry of National Defense will assign a troop of army engineers and navy frogmen to remove the sediment that has accumulated at the bottom of the Shihmen Reservoir in the hope of solving the area's recurring water shortage problem, Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) said yesterday.
Su made the remarks on the legislative floor yesterday when questioned by lawmakers on a two-year, NT$309 million (US$1.106 billion) floodwater control budget -- the first stage of a proposed total budget of NT$116 billion that will be appropriated over eight years.
In response to Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Hsu Shu-po's (許舒博) question, Su said Minister of National Defense Lee Jye (李傑) on Monday had approved the Ministry of Economic Affairs' request that the army help out in removing silt and sediment in the reservoir.
"Estimates put the total amount of sediment buildup every three years in all of the nation's reservoirs at about the size of a Sun Moon Lake (
Hsu said that as it is getting harder to build new reservoirs because of environmental concerns, increasing the reservoir's capacity by resolving the sediment problem could be a solution.
The problem with sedimentation, resulting from heavy rains washing soil and other debris produced by deforestation, farming and road constructions in mountainous areas into the Shihmen Reservoir, has often caused the suspension of water supply in northern Taiwan.
The government has earmarked an eight-year, NT$116 billion flood- control budget to resolve the twin problems of flooding and water supply suspension that plague the nation every summer.
Independent Legislator May Chin (
"There are about 30 Aboriginal tribes in the country, none of which are free from the threat of flood every time there is typhoon," she said.
The whole NT$116 billion project will be funded by a special budget, with the government selling state-owned stocks and raising debt to collect funds.
For the first stage of the pro-ject, NT$10 billion will be raised from selling state-owned stocks of Taiwan Cooperative Bank and Taiwan Tobacco and Liquor Corp; the remaining NT$20.9 billion will be financed from debt.
China has reserved offshore airspace in the Yellow Sea and East China Sea from March 27 to May 6, issuing alerts usually used to warn of military exercises, although no such exercises have been announced, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported yesterday. Reserving such a large area for 40 days without explanation is an “unusual step,” as military exercises normally only last a few days, the paper said. These alerts, known as Notice to Air Missions (Notams), “are intended to inform pilots and aviation authorities of temporary airspace hazards or restrictions,” the article said. The airspace reserved in the alert is
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More than 6,000 Taiwanese students have participated in exchange programs in China over the past two years, despite the Mainland Affairs Council’s (MAC) “orange light” travel advisory, government records showed. The MAC’s publicly available registry showed that Taiwanese college and university students who went on exchange programs across the Strait numbered 3,592 and 2,966 people respectively. The National Immigration Agency data revealed that 2,296 and 2,551 Chinese students visited Taiwan for study in the same two years. A review of the Web sites of publicly-run universities and colleges showed that Taiwanese higher education institutions continued to recruit students for Chinese educational programs without
The first bluefin tuna of the season, brought to shore in Pingtung County and weighing 190kg, was yesterday auctioned for NT$10,600 (US$333.5) per kilogram, setting a record high for the local market. The auction was held at the fish market in Donggang Fishing Harbor, where the Siaoliouciou Island-registered fishing vessel Fu Yu Ching No. 2 delivered the “Pingtung First Tuna” it had caught for bidding. Bidding was intense, and the tuna was ultimately jointly purchased by a local restaurant and a local company for NT$10,600 per kilogram — NT$300 ,more than last year — for a total of NT$2.014 million. The 67-year-old skipper
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