The Tainan City Government is planning to turn its largest wholesale food market into a leisure area where people can shop in a modern setting while embracing nature.
A fruit and vegetable market in Sinhua District (新化), expected to open in September, is to feature an open structure with a terraced green roof accessible from its eastern corner, where terraces would take shoppers down to the ground level, the Tainan Agriculture Bureau has said.
The terraces above the market would also feature local crops — pineapples, rice, roses and tea — said one of the market’s designers, Dutch architectural firm MVRDV.
The market would feature benches and picnic tables under the roof, giving the appearance of rolling green hills and providing a leisure destination, it said.
MVRDV said it hopes that the market would symbolize the beauty of rural Tainan.
The new market would replace an existing one in Sinhua that has been the city’s largest agricultural trade hub since it integrated four smaller markets in neighboring districts in 2012, bureau officials said.
However, the current facility has become outdated and cannot accommodate the increasing trade volume, they said.
It has also led to environmental problems, as it is at the center of a densely populated residential area, the officials said.
Hopefully, the new market, near the Formosa Freeway (Freeway No. 3), would increase the trading volume of 50,000 to 60,000 tonnes per year to more than 80,000 tonnes, they said.
The increased space and modern facilities could make it easier for vendors to adopt auctioning rather than bargaining, which is more commonly seen in traditional markets and which curbs profitability, the officials said. Tainan has an agricultural output value of more than NT$60 billion (US$2.12 billion) per year, the largest among the nation’s six special municipalities.
STATS: Taiwan’s average life expectancy of 80.77 years was lower than that of Japan, Singapore and South Korea, but higher than in China, Malaysia and Indonesia Taiwan’s average life expectancy last year increased to 80.77 years, but was still not back to its pre-COVID-19 pandemic peak of 81.32 years in 2020, the Ministry of the Interior said yesterday. The average life expectancy last year increased the 0.54 years from 2023, the ministry said in a statement. For men and women, the average life expectancy last year was 77.42 years and 84.30 years respectively, up 0.48 years and 0.56 years from the previous year. Taiwan’s average life expectancy peaked at 81.32 years in 2020, as the nation was relatively unaffected by the pandemic that year. The metric
Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp. (THSRC) plans to ease strained capacity during peak hours by introducing new fare rules restricting passengers traveling without reserved seats in 2026, company Chairman Shih Che (史哲) said Wednesday. THSRC needs to tackle its capacity issue because there have been several occasions where passengers holding tickets with reserved seats did not make it onto their train in stations packed with individuals traveling without a reserved seat, Shih told reporters in a joint interview in Taipei. Non-reserved seats allow travelers maximum flexibility, but it has led to issues relating to quality of service and safety concerns, especially during
A magnitude 5.1 earthquake struck Chiayi County at 4:37pm today, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The hypocenter was 36.3km southeast of Chiayi County Hall at a depth of 10.4km, CWA data showed. There were no immediate reports of damage resulting from the quake. The intensity of the quake, which gauges the actual effect of a seismic event, measured 4 in Chiayi County, Tainan and Kaohsiung on Taiwan's seven-tier intensity scale, the data showed. The quake had an intensity of 3 in Chiayi City and Yunlin County, while it was measured as 2 in Pingtung, Taitung, Hualien, Changhua, Nantou and Penghu counties, the data
The Supreme Court today rejected an appeal filed by former Air Force officer Shih Chun-cheng (史濬程), convicted of Chinese Communist Party (CCP) espionage, finalizing his sentence at two years and two months for contravening the National Security Act (國家安全法). His other ruling, a ten-month sentence for an additional contravention, was meanwhile overturned and sent to the Taichung branch of the High Court for retrial, the Supreme Court said today. Prosecutors have been notified as Shih is considered a flight risk. Shih was recruited by Chinese Communist Party (CCP) intelligence officials after his retirement in 2008 and appointed as a supervisor
RSS