The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency yesterday announced that it would boost quarantine sampling of custard apple exports to China.
Starting yesterday, quarantine sampling of exports of atemoya — a hybrid variety of custard apple — to China would step up from double the rate that other produce is subject to, to triple, the agency said.
Inspectors would also intensify checks on boxes deep inside shipment containers, it added.
Photo: Yang Yuan-ting, Taipei Times
If pests are found at the scene, the supplier would be requested to improve and its produce would then be resampled, with quarantine certificates only issued when no pests are found, the agency said.
The stricter sampling and examination is a response to pests reportedly being detected in a recent container of custard apples exported to China.
The batch was exported to China earlier this month, the first shipment after Beijing suspended imports of a variety of fruits in September 2021 due to pest concerns.
The contaminated goods would be sent back and operations at the plant responsible, the Taitung Area Farmers’ Association (EastFA), would be suspended for 10 days, Taitung County Commissioner Yao Ching-ling (饒慶鈴) said on Wednesday.
EastFA would comply with the order and as the peak harvest season is yet to arrive, the pause would have minimal impact on farmers, EastFA chief of staff Lee Chien-tung (李建通) said on Wednesday.
As China has not issued any official documents regarding the incident, the agency could not confirm what type of pests had been detected, Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency Deputy Director-General Du Li-hwa (杜麗華) said.
Acting Minister of Agriculture Chen Junne-jih (陳駿季) earlier this month said that China’s decision to resume imports came following negotiations between China and the county government, not through official channels.
The Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency urged China to resume communications on the official cooperation agreement platform of the two nations.
A magnitude 6.4 earthquake struck off the coast of Hualien County in eastern Taiwan at 7pm yesterday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The epicenter of the temblor was at sea, about 69.9km south of Hualien County Hall, at a depth of 30.9km, it said. There were no immediate reports of damage resulting from the quake. The earthquake’s intensity, which gauges the actual effect of a temblor, was highest in Taitung County’s Changbin Township (長濱), where it measured 5 on Taiwan’s seven-tier intensity scale. The quake also measured an intensity of 4 in Hualien, Nantou, Chiayi, Yunlin, Changhua and Miaoli counties, as well as
Taiwan is to have nine extended holidays next year, led by a nine-day Lunar New Year break, the Cabinet announced yesterday. The nine-day Lunar New Year holiday next year matches the length of this year’s holiday, which featured six extended holidays. The increase in extended holidays is due to the Act on the Implementation of Commemorative and Festival Holidays (紀念日及節日實施條例), which was passed early last month with support from the opposition Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party. Under the new act, the day before Lunar New Year’s Eve is also a national holiday, and Labor Day would no longer be limited
COMMITMENTS: The company had a relatively low renewable ratio at 56 percent and did not have any goal to achieve 100 percent renewable energy, the report said Pegatron Corp ranked the lowest among five major final assembly suppliers in progressing toward Apple Inc’s commitment to be 100 percent carbon neutral by 2030, a Greenpeace East Asia report said yesterday. While Apple has set the goal of using 100 percent renewable energy across its entire business, supply chain and product lifecycle by 2030, carbon emissions from electronics manufacturing are rising globally due to increased energy consumption, it said. Given that carbon emissions from its supply chain accounted for more than half of its total emissions last year, Greenpeace East Asia evaluated the green transition performance of Apple’s five largest final
The first tropical storm of the year in the western North Pacific, Wutip (蝴蝶), has formed over the South China Sea and is expected to move toward Hainan Island off southern China, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said today. The agency said a tropical depression over waters near the Paracel and Zhongsha islands strengthened into a tropical storm this morning. The storm had maximum sustained winds near its center of 64.8kph, with peak gusts reaching 90kph, it said. Winds at Beaufort scale level 7 — ranging from 50kph to 61.5kph — extended up to 80km from the center, it added. Forecaster Kuan Hsin-ping
RSS