Blaze erupted at textile warehouse in Tainan

Taiwan News
Date: 2019/01/12
By: Matthew Strong, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – A man from China who went missing during a fire in Tainan was found dead, according to media reports Saturday.

Around 11 a.m., a huge cloud of black smoke emerged from a warehouse in the Shanhua District believed to be filled with textiles and other flammable materials, the Apple Daily reported.    [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2019/01/12
By: Tyson Lu, Liu Chien-pang, and Chi Jo-yao

Taipei, Jan. 12 (CNA) Eleven overstaying Vietnamese nationals were located in Taitung, including one migrant worker who left his official place of work, one illegal worker and nine tourists who overstayed their visas, according to Taitung County Police Bureau Saturday.

The 11 Vietnamese, dressed in the clothes of agricultural workers and rain boots, claimed to be employed doing farm work in the county and were found in the back of a cargo truck covered with black canvas, the police bureau said.

The Vietnamese were brought to the Taitung office of the National Immigration Agency (NIA) because they failed to provide documents verifying their identities, the police said.

None of the 11 people — seven males and four females — are connected to the 148 Vietnamese who left their tour groups after entering Taiwan last month, the bureau added.
[FULL  STORY]

NO-KILL POLICY: Shelters have been crowded since it in 2017 became illegal to put down animals that do not pose a threat, and advocates suggested catching fewer animals

Taipei Times
Date: Jan 13, 2019
By: Lin Chia-nan  /  Staff reporter

Public animal shelters in eight municipalities last year received more animals than their

capacities allowed, which an animal rights advocate said was due to official negligence in the run-up to the Nov. 24 local elections.

Public shelters in Taipei, Tainan, Taoyuan, Chiayi City and Hsinchu, Nantou, Yunlin and Pingtung counties have been housing more animals than they were designed for, Council of Agriculture data for November last year showed.

The Taipei shelter housed a total of 1,120 animals, almost double its maximum capacity of 610, the data showed.

Shelters in Taichung and Kaohsiung, as well as Chiayi, Penghu and Kinmen counties, were at more than 90 percent capacity, the data showed.    [FULL  STORY]

Discussion on PTT, Taiwan’s largest online forum, has taken a political tone regarding African swine fever.

The News Lens
Date: 2019/01/11
By: I-fan Lin, Global Voices

When a dead pig washed ashore on Kinmen Island, Taiwan on Dec. 31, it was more than just a sad sight.

The pig carcass tested positive for African Swine Fever (ASF). Although it is harmless to humans, ASF is highly contagious among pigs. It cannot be cured or prevented by vaccine and can be spread by live or dead pigs, as well as by pork products. Since August 2018, the deadly pig virus has swept across China, leading to the culling of more than 600,000 pigs.

In the fall of 2018, sausages from China that had been exported to Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and Thailand tested positive for the virus. Experts are worried that if the virus continues to spread, it will bring economic catastrophe to multiple Asian countries.

In September 2018, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations held an emergency meeting and sent warnings about the spread of ASF to officials from Cambodia, Japan, Laos, Mongolia, Myanmar, the Philippines, South Korea, Thailand and Vietnam.
[FULL  STORY]

A footage of the rainbow has garnered more than 9 million views on Twitter

Taiwan News
Date: 2019/01/11
By: Huang Tzu-ti, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – A clip shared on Twitter capturing the stunning view of a “full circle” rainbow last December has received more than 9 million views and been retweeted over 300,000 times.

Keat Grant, a 21-year-old Twitter user from California, posted the footage on Dec. 19 last year, asking “Have you ever seen a full rainbow before?” The location where the rainbow was spotted was not revealed, but the man apparently was standing on a balcony high above the ground when he filmed the footage.

The natural wonder was made even more breathtaking against the backdrop of a clear sky and above an aquamarine bay. “It’s definitely a portal to another universe,” he concluded.

The post has been flooded with comments expressing awe at the unusual sight. Alluding to the folklore that a pot of gold can be found at the end of a rainbow, a Twitter user quipped that since “it’s a circle technically there is no end, so we got bamboozled.”
[FULL  STORY]

CREATIVE PROPERTY: The Tourism Bureau said that while it believes it owns the rights to filmmaker Chi Po-lin’s footage, it should have asked permission

Taipei Times
Date: Jan 12, 2019
By: Wang Jung-hsiang and Jonathan Chin  /  Staff reporter, with staff writer

Kaohsiung Tourism Bureau Director Pan Heng-hsu (潘恆旭) yesterday apologized over

allegations that a promotional video, produced under contract by actress Pai Ping-ping (白冰冰), had used unattributed footage from the works of filmmaker Chi Po-lin (齊柏林).

After accusations of plagiarism against Pai surfaced on social media, Taiwan Aerial Imaging — a studio that Chi cofounded — on Thursday said that Pai had used Chi’s 2013 Kaoshiung: A View From Above (飛閱高雄) for her own video Visiting Kaohsiung (來去高雄).

The studio said on Facebook that Chi had specified in his will that, if his films were to be used for non-commercial purposes, they should be played in their entirety.

“Out of respect for the original creator’s ideals and creative principles, we request that Chi’s films be played in their entirety,” the studio said.    [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan’s drive to make English a national language enjoys public support but does not come without challenges.

The News Lens
Date: 2019/01/10
By Isabel Eliassen and Timothy S. Rich, Taiwan Insight

For several months, Taiwanese officials have been drafting plans to make Taiwan into a Mandarin-English bilingual nation. By 2019 the government hopes to have concrete policy goals in place. So far, the policies center around increasing the number of qualified English teachers in Taiwan, utilizing free online resources, and more intensive English classes starting at a younger age.

The administration aims to make Taiwan fully bilingual by 2030. Singapore, even with a British colonial influence, took 20 years to establish English bilingual policy, with schools teaching English alongside the first languages of Mandarin, Malay, or Tamil, so Taiwan’s 2030 goal appears quite ambitious. Even if Taiwan is not fully bilingual by that time, it will be clear whether the new policies have been effective or if they need to be revised. The government has also set several short-term goals, including having versions of government websites in English and encouraging government employees to use English at work.

Initially, the government hoped to make English an official language of Taiwan, but that would entail translation of all government documents to English, a very expensive task. In order to avoid this, the Ministry of Education has decided to instead concentrate on the more essential aspects of the policy that encourage English-Mandarin bilingualism in Taiwan. However, some of the current plans seem more focused on bringing English-speaking workers to Taiwan rather than making Taiwanese workers more appealing to companies. For instance, National Development Council Minister Chen Mei-ling (陳美伶) says the government intends to make some licensure exams available in English as well as making essential documents for foreigners available. Despite this, Taiwanese still seem largely supportive of the policy, perhaps recognizing that it still has benefits.

As part of a web survey through National Chengchi University’s PollcrcacyLab, we asked 1,000 Taiwanese the following question: “In your opinion, should Taiwan establish English alongside Mandarin as a national language?” While these figures are notably lower than the figures from a similar survey by the Professor Huang Kun-huei Education Foundation (黃昆輝教授基金會) reported in December, 71 percent of our respondents said that they supported this policy. Disaggregated by partisanship, by gender, and by preference for Taiwan’s status (unification vs. status quo vs. independence), clear majorities still support this policy, suggesting that it will not face large-scale opposition.    [FULL  STORY\

It is the first bikeway to have been built from an abandoned railway in Taiwan

Taiwan News
Date: 2019/01/10
By: George Liao, Taiwan News, Staff Writer

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Dongfeng Bicycle Green Way (東豐自行車綠廊), a 12-km long bikeway which crosses Fengyuan, Shigang, and Dongshi districts of Taichung City, is the first bikeway to have been built from an abandoned railway in Taiwan.

The predecessor of the bikeway was called Dongfeng Railway, or Dongshi Branch Line, which was built in 1958 and ran through Fengyuan, Shigang, and Dongshi for transporting the wood of red cypress, yellow cedar, and China fir in Dongshi, materials for building Shihgang Dam, as well as the abundant agriculture produce in the area.

The tree-lined Dongfeng Bicycle Green Way was inaugurated on Nov. 15, 2000, and since then it has become a choice spot for residents of Taichung to relax, recreate, as well as burn calories.

Shihgang Dam, Dongshi Hakka Cultural Park, landscape architecture, as well as natural ecology along the bikeway are sure to delight every visitor.    [FULL  STORY]