Pingtung County fishers have collected more than 57 tonnes of marine debris under a reward program introduced by the local government in 2022 to mitigate the impact of ocean waste on marine life and marine ecosystems.
Under the program, Pingtung fishing boats have brought in 57.9 tonnes of trash they found while operating in the open sea to 23 security inspection centers at their home ports across the county in exchange for home-grown agricultural or eco-friendly products, the Pingtung County Environmental Protection Bureau said on Thursday.
Last year, a reward points system was launched, allowing fishers to exchange the waste they collect from the sea for household appliances, which provides a further boost to the program aiming to reduce marine debris at the source, the bureau said.
Photo courtesy of the Pingtung County Government
Protecting marine ecosystems is a critical and urgent task, with surveys showing 8 million tonnes of plastic, the main component of marine debris, enter the ocean globally per year, the Pingtung County Government said.
Plastic particles in the ocean eaten by fish are eventually consumed by people through the food chain, and as such represent a major threat to the environment and ecosystems, it said.
A fishing boat skipper surnamed Chiang (江) said that due to the reward program, he is now more motivated to look for marine debris.
“Though a small action, it will change the whole picture as long as everyone becomes part of the program,” he said.
To encourage foreign fishers to also join in the initiative, the bureau has printed booklets explaining how it works in six languages — English, Indonesian, Thai, Malay, Filipino and Vietnamese.
A small number of Taiwanese this year lost their citizenship rights after traveling in China and obtaining a one-time Chinese passport to cross the border into Russia, a source said today. The people signed up through Chinese travel agencies for tours of neighboring Russia with companies claiming they could obtain Russian visas and fast-track border clearance, the source said on condition of anonymity. The travelers were actually issued one-time-use Chinese passports, they said. Taiwanese are prohibited from holding a Chinese passport or household registration. If found to have a Chinese ID, they may lose their resident status under Article 9-1
Taiwanese were praised for their composure after a video filmed by Taiwanese tourists capturing the moment a magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck Japan’s Aomori Prefecture went viral on social media. The video shows a hotel room shaking violently amid Monday’s quake, with objects falling to the ground. Two Taiwanese began filming with their mobile phones, while two others held the sides of a TV to prevent it from falling. When the shaking stopped, the pair calmly took down the TV and laid it flat on a tatami mat, the video shows. The video also captured the group talking about the safety of their companions bathing
PROBLEMATIC APP: Citing more than 1,000 fraud cases, the government is taking the app down for a year, but opposition voices are calling it censorship Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) yesterday decried a government plan to suspend access to Chinese social media platform Xiaohongshu (小紅書) for one year as censorship, while the Presidential Office backed the plan. The Ministry of the Interior on Thursday cited security risks and accusations that the Instagram-like app, known as Rednote in English, had figured in more than 1,700 fraud cases since last year. The company, which has about 3 million users in Taiwan, has not yet responded to requests for comment. “Many people online are already asking ‘How to climb over the firewall to access Xiaohongshu,’” Cheng posted on
A magnitude 5.7 earthquake yesterday struck off the coast of Hualien, causing brief transportation disruptions in northern and eastern Taiwan, as authorities said that aftershocks of magnitude 5 or higher could occur over the next three days. The quake, which hit at 7:24pm at a depth of 24.5km, registered an intensity of 4 in Hualien and Nantou counties, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. There were no immediate reports of damage or injuries. In Taipei, the MRT railway’s operations control center received an earthquake alert and initiated standard safety procedures, briefly halting trains on the Bannan (blue) line for about a minute.
RSS