The Chiayi County Government is using high-tech tools, such as drones and artificial intelligence (AI) fire detection systems, in an effort to stop farmers from illegally burning rice straw that remains after the harvest.
The county — Taiwan’s third-largest rice-producing municipality by volume — is entering the year’s second rice harvest. Farmers often burn crop waste to clear their fields.
The Chiayi government said in a statement on Tuesday that it tries to curb illegal open burns, imposing fines from NT$1,200 to NT$100,000 under the Air Pollution Control Act (空氣污染防制法).
Photo courtesy of the Chiayi County Government via CNA
The county has promoted and subsidized the use of bacteria-based products to break down rice stalks as an alternative to burning, which expedites the composting process and results in more nutrient-rich soil, it said.
The county’s Environmental Protection Bureau has established a 13-person team to locate illegal fires, utilizing drones, satellite remote sensing, and AI-based smoke and fire detection systems, the statement said.
As of Nov. 30, the bureau had issued 31 fines for illegal burning on 21 hectares of rice paddies, accounting for 0.06 percent of the county’s farmland under cultivation, it said.
Yang Chih-che (楊智哲), a researcher at the Tainan District Agricultural Research and Extension Station, said that switching from controlled burns to composting is often in the farmers’ best interests.
A Taiwanese woman on Sunday was injured by a small piece of masonry that fell from the dome of St Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican during a visit to the church. The tourist, identified as Hsu Yun-chen (許芸禎), was struck on the forehead while she and her tour group were near Michelangelo’s sculpture Pieta. Hsu was rushed to a hospital, the group’s guide to the church, Fu Jing, said yesterday. Hsu was found not to have serious injuries and was able to continue her tour as scheduled, Fu added. Mathew Lee (李世明), Taiwan’s recently retired ambassador to the Holy See, said he met
A BETRAYAL? It is none of the ministry’s business if those entertainers love China, but ‘you cannot agree to wipe out your own country,’ the MAC minister said Taiwanese entertainers in China would have their Taiwanese citizenship revoked if they are holding Chinese citizenship, Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) said. Several Taiwanese entertainers, including Patty Hou (侯佩岑) and Ouyang Nana (歐陽娜娜), earlier this month on their Weibo (微博) accounts shared a picture saying that Taiwan would be “returned” to China, with tags such as “Taiwan, Province of China” or “Adhere to the ‘one China’ principle.” The MAC would investigate whether those Taiwanese entertainers have Chinese IDs and added that it would revoke their Taiwanese citizenship if they did, Chiu told the Chinese-language Liberty Times (sister paper
The Chinese wife of a Taiwanese, surnamed Liu (劉), who openly advocated for China’s use of force against Taiwan, would be forcibly deported according to the law if she has not left Taiwan by Friday, National Immigration Agency (NIA) officials said yesterday. Liu, an influencer better known by her online channel name Yaya in Taiwan (亞亞在台灣), obtained permanent residency via marriage to a Taiwanese. She has been reported for allegedly repeatedly espousing pro-unification comments on her YouTube and TikTok channels, including comments supporting China’s unification with Taiwan by force and the Chinese government’s stance that “Taiwan is an inseparable part of China.” Liu
A crowd of over 200 people gathered outside the Taipei District Court as two sisters indicted for abusing a 1-year-old boy to death attended a preliminary hearing in the case yesterday afternoon. The crowd held up signs and chanted slogans calling for aggravated penalties in child abuse cases and asking for no bail and “capital punishment.” They also held white flowers in memory of the boy, nicknamed Kai Kai (剴剴), who was allegedly tortured to death by the sisters in December 2023. The boy died four months after being placed in full-time foster care with the
RSS