The Taipei City Government declared yesterday it would strengthen measures to prevent illegal dumping of trash, while announcing it would stop collecting trash bags from 182 illegal dumping sites and encourage residents to report violators to the city government.
In an effort to clamp down on illegal dumping of trash bags, Taipei City’s Environmental Protection Department last month stopped collecting trash bags dumped at illegal sites near the Chinese Cultural University and in the Wenshan District and decided to expand the scale to 182 locations in various communities where trash bags are often found.
“Not collecting trash bags that were dumped illegally will hopefully prevent people from dumping trash bags, especially when we only see more bags piling up there after collections,” said Liang Hung-lang (梁宏郎), a department division chief.
Liang said the number of bags was reduced from 3,499 per day to 810 per day after the city stopped cleaning up trash bags at the two locations.
Liang said the department will disinfect the illegal dumping sites, but will stop collecting trash bags to discourage people from leaving trash.
Inspecting an illegal dumping site in the city’s Hsinyi District, Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) expressed his support for the measure, and said the city government would provide cash rewards of between NT$600 and NT$3,000 to those who help the department catch violators.
“Maintaining a clean environment is the responsibility of all residents and we urge all Taipei residents to protect our environment together,” Hau said.
The department encouraged citizens to provide pictures and information about violators to the department.
Taipei City initiated its “keep trash off the ground” policy in 1995 and the “fee per package” policy on July 1, 2000.
Only regulation-sized bags are accepted for collection under the scheme. People found not using such bags or dumping outside specified garbage collection points face fines of between NT$1,200 and NT$6,000.
Considering that most countries issue more than five denominations of banknotes, the central bank has decided to redesign all five denominations, the bank said as it prepares for the first major overhaul of the banknotes in more than 24 years. Central bank Governor Yang Chin-lung (楊金龍) is expected to report to the Legislative Yuan today on the bank’s operations and the redesign’s progress. The bank in a report sent to the legislature ahead of today’s meeting said it had commissioned a survey on the public’s preferences. Survey results showed that NT$100 and NT$1,000 banknotes are the most commonly used, while NT$200 and NT$2,000
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported the first case of a new COVID-19 subvariant — BA.3.2 — in a 10-year-old Singaporean girl who had a fever upon arrival in Taiwan and tested positive for the disease. The girl left Taiwan on March 20 and the case did not have a direct impact on the local community, it said. The WHO added the BA.3.2 strain to its list of Variants Under Monitoring in December last year, but this was the first imported case of the COVID-19 variant in Taiwan, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ming-cheng (林明誠) said. The girl arrived in Taiwan on
South Korea is planning to revise its controversial electronic arrival card, a step Taiwanese officials said prompted them to hold off on planned retaliatory measures, a South Korean media report said yesterday. A Yonhap News Agency report said that the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs is planning to remove the “previous departure place” and “next destination” fields from its e-arrival card system. The plan, reached after interagency consultations, is under review and aims to simplify entry procedures and align the electronic form with the paper version, a South Korean ministry official said. The fields — which appeared only on the electronic form
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) is suspending retaliation measures against South Korea that were set to take effect tomorrow, after Seoul said it is updating its e-arrival system, MOFA said today. The measures were to be a new round of retaliation after Taiwan on March 1 changed South Korea's designation on government-issued alien resident certificates held by South Korean nationals to "South Korea” from the "Republic of Korea," the country’s official name. The move came after months of protests to Seoul over its listing of Taiwan as "China (Taiwan)" in dropdown menus on its new online immigration entry system. MOFA last week
RSS