Penghu County’s Taipei Affairs Office on Saturday announced plans to hold a “Penghu Week” after one of the outlying island’s local delicacies, ice cream made from cactus fruit, proved surprisingly popular at FamilyMart over the International Workers’ Day long weekend.
Office director Chen Chi-yu (陳其育) said the office sealed a deal with the convenience store chain in August last year to use local cactus plants as a base for ice cream.
The deal was to be an introductory event to pave the way for Penghu agricultural and fishery products — such as Penghu sponge gourds, snow melons, the common ice plant and herbal tea made from Glossocardia bidens — to be better received on Taiwan proper, he said.
Photo courtesy of the Penghu County Government
Penghu County Commissioner Lai Feng-wei (賴峰偉) said that the county’s Agriculture and Fisheries Bureau and local farmers’ associations helped to gather sufficient cactus fruit to make the ice cream.
The ice cream was launched on May 1, and its success was reflected by people sharing photographs and impressions of the product online, Chen said.
The success of the ice cream has helped promote Penghu County and could, with the COVID-19 outbreak seemingly stabilizing in Taiwan, help prime the nation for Penghu’s tourism season, he added.
The office is in the process of talking with Familymart about holding Penghu Week events and selling unique local products at Familymart stores nationwide.
Commenting on the sale of fishery products, Chen said that the office and the bureau would be working through online platforms and focusing on delivery during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Companies and corporate unions have been visiting Penghu to see the fishery products, which underscores the success of the office’s sales pitch, Chen said.
The county is looking to work with National Chung Hsing University and corporations to establish an agriculture zone in Penghu that would offer young people or those willing to devote themselves to agriculture a place to work, he added.
This would provide jobs for locals, provide a use for otherwise unused land and address the limited production of fishery products in the county, Chen said.
Eight Chinese naval vessels and 24 military aircraft were detected crossing the median line of the Taiwan Strait between 6am yesterday and 6am today, the Ministry of National Defense said this morning. The aircraft entered Taiwan’s northern, central, southwestern and eastern air defense identification zones, the ministry said. The armed forces responded with mission aircraft, naval vessels and shore-based missile systems to closely monitor the situation, it added. Eight naval vessels, one official ship and 36 aircraft sorties were spotted in total, the ministry said.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) today said that if South Korea does not reply appropriately to its request to correct Taiwan’s name on its e-Arrival card system before March 31, it would take corresponding measures to alter how South Korea is labeled on the online Taiwan Arrival Card system. South Korea’s e-Arrival card system lists Taiwan as “China (Taiwan)” in the “point of departure” and “next destination” fields. The ministry said that it changed the nationality for South Koreans on Taiwan’s Alien Resident Certificates from “Korea” to “South Korea” on March 1, in a gesture of goodwill and based on the
Taiwanese officials were shown the first of 66 F-16V fighter jets purchased by Taiwan from the United States, the Ministry of National Defense said yesterday, adding the aircraft has completed an initial flight test and is expected to be delivered later this year. A delegation led by Deputy Minister of National Defense Hsu Szu-chien (徐斯儉) visited Lockheed Martin’s F-16 C/D Block 70 (also known as F-16V) assembly line in South Carolina on March 16 to view the aircraft. The jet will undergo a final acceptance flight in the US before being delivered to Taiwan, the
The New Taipei Metro's Sanyin Line and the eastern extension of the Taipei Metro's Tamsui-Xinyi Line (Red Line) are scheduled to begin operations in June, the National Development Council said today. The Red Line, which terminates at Xiangshan Station, would be connected by the 1.4km extension to a new eastern terminal, Guangci/Fengtian Temple Station, while the Sanyin Line would link New Taipei City's Tucheng and Yingge stations via Sanxia District (三峽). The council gave the updates at a council meeting reviewing progress on public construction projects for this year. Taiwan's annual public infrastructure budget would remain at NT$800 billion (US$25.08 billion), with NT$97.3
RSS