Vice Minister of Education Lu Mu-lin (呂木琳) said yesterday that the government’s transition from Tongyong Pinyin to Hanyu Pinyin as the standard Mandarin Romanization system was in its final stages.
Lu made the remarks at a Research, Development and Evaluation Commission seminar on the Cabinet’s efforts to create an internationalized living environment.
Lu said the government has been promoting the adoption of Hanyu Pinyin — the same system used in China — in three stages since last October.
The focus in this stage will be on converting tourism brochures and street names to Hanyu pinyin, Lu said.
“Tongyong Pinyin was unable to completely solve the problem of international flow in the aspects of functionality, internationalization and informationization,” Lu said in English.
Lu emphasized the need to create a friendly environment for foreigners in Taiwan, but proceeded to speak to forum attendees — many of whom were expatriates — in Mandarin.
Supporters of Hanyu Pinyin say it would bring Romanization in Taiwan in line with international practice, while opponents feel it would remove a point of distinction between Taiwan and China. Tongyong — the Romanization system promoted while the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) was in power — is also said to be more adaptable to Hoklo and Hakka, Taiwan’s other main languages.
Wade-Giles and other less prominent Romanization systems have been used in Taiwan for decades, leaving many place names with multiple spellings.
Efforts to unify Romanization around the country have run into political resistance, and it is unclear if the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government will be able to enforce the use of Hanyu Pinyin in DPP-controlled areas.
Lu said the government should make good use of language to strengthen the desire of foreigners to visit Taiwan.
“Those who have been to Korea often have difficulty understanding the nation’s signs in Korean. This makes [Korea] an unfriendly environment [to foreigners],” Lu said.
Minister Without Portfolio Ovid Tseng (曾志朗) said he had found many “unforgivable” mistakes on government English Web sites.
“This society is striving to be competitive in many ways ... we really have to rethink how to create an environment for foreigners living, working in and visiting Taiwan,” Tseng said in English.
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