Stay away from Made in China -- particularly food:

POLLUTION IN CHINA'S FARMLAND TRIGGERS FOOD SHORTAGE CONCERNS

by FRANCES MARTEL 4 Jan 2014, 10:36 AM PDT 

The horrifying statistics from the Chinese government's latest ecological survey find that a land area the size of Belgium is now too polluted to grow crops in and 28,000 of the country's rivers have disappeared since 1990. With China's population on the rise, pollution and nutritional demand could create a perfect storm for famine.

According to Bloomberg, more than 2% of China's land is no longer usable due to pollution deposits from many government-owned industrial projects. It had been previously revealed that around 15% of the land is polluted in some capacity. The pollution consists mostly of toxic metals, many of which have been found in rice and other crops in land previously believed to be arable. Even when the land is found usable in some form, farmers have unknowingly watered crops with contaminated water or used seeds from other parts of the country more susceptible to pollutants. 

Since only 10% of China's total land is available to grow crops on to begin with (much of China is either mountain or desert, and the remaining area too urban for farming), losing 2% of it significantly diminishes the amount of available land for growing. The announcement was made by Vice Minister of Land and Resources Wang Shiyuan, but with little more information, as most of the state-sponsored study conducted between 1996 and 2014 was a "state secret" and unavailable to the public. Shiyuan did promise, however, that "tens of billions of yuan" will be poured into solving the problem.

As for the river situation, Vice notes that the Yangtze and Pearl River deltas are the most polluted because of the amount of industrial work taking place there. It also notes tens of thousands of smaller rivers have since evaporated or otherwise been destroyed. 

Reports of toxic food have not been uncovered alone without damage, however. The New York Times notes that many farmers in inland China have reported an uptick in cancer cases and strange illnesses. The cancer threat is so worrisome to some poorer farmers that one woman told the Times she and her husband deliberately refuse to go to the doctor for check-ups, because cancer is "only a burden on the children" and they would rather die while saving the money any attempt at fighting cancer would require.

The pollution problems surface at a time when Beijing has been unable to hide other kinds of pollution-- most notably, smog so thick that it has grounded flights and sickened enough people to require specialized smog clinics to open in some regions. Unlike the air pollution, however, this underground threat hurts China's ability to be independent from food exports to feed its massive population. That population is expected to grow over the 

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KMT Dictatorship Era Propaganda Continues to Fester in Academic Publications

In an A.D. 2000  publication, Language Planning in Nepal, Taiwan and Sweden, edited by Richard B. Baldauf, Jr. and Robert B. Kaplan, the writer of the section on Taiwan, Feng-fu Tsao, weaves into his narrative lies and propaganda of the KMT Dictatorship Era. Perhaps he, himself is ignorant of the truth. For a linguist like Dr. Tsao who seems to advocate preserving non-Mandarin languages, he should realize that the first step to doing so is helping language speakers have an accurate understanding of their own history. It is regrettable that the editors did not do more fact checking. Following is a review written on Google Books.

We would like to ask the readers of the blog that whenever you come across propaganda like that, please write a review correcting it. If we keep hammering the factual inaccuracies, perhaps academics will finally get the message.

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REVIEW:

This book contains many errors regarding Taiwan's history, particularly concerning the post-Japanese era.  It shows a bias towards the propaganda promulgated during the dictatorship era of the Chinese Nationalist Party.

The writer claims that the Chinese Nationalists from China were more educated than the Taiwanese;  to the contrary, the Taiwanese were vastly more educated having studied in the Japanese imperial university -- doctors, lawyers, societal leaders.  Think: the Chinese Nationalists had been fighting wars for years in China while Taiwan was at peace under an advanced colonial administration where Taiwanese had formed political parties and had a thriving written culture, recording arts, etc. I have heard personal accounts that for example, the Chinese Nationalist officers in the army were so ignorant that they did not know about plumbing.  In one case, a Chinese Nationalist Party officer was amazed how water came out of spigots and so he went to a local shop and bought many and started putting them into the walls.  He got angry because no water came out of the spigots and assumed that the Taiwanese supplier had cheated him.

Further, while the writers claim that the 228 Massacre was supposedly "put down troops from the Mainland," the troops from China were the ones who actually perpetrated the massacre.  Chen Yi's handling of Taiwan was not one of ethnic or linguistic misunderstanding but rather a systematic corrupt policy of stripping the wealth of the Taiwanese people and putting it into the hands of corrupt Chinese Nationalist Party officials.  Declaring monopolies on products, seizing businesses and assets, and rampant inflation of the currency caused the Taiwanese people to rise up against the oppressors.  Committees of citizens ran out the corrupt officials in each town and formed negotiating committees to demand political reforms from Chen Yi.  While he pretended to negotiate, he sent telegrams to China for Chiang Kai-shek to send troops.  They arrived in Keelung and then marched throughout Taiwan killing Taiwanese.  All of the Taiwanese leaders of each town whom Chen Yi had information about were arrested and executed.  It is estimated that 20,000 Taiwanese were murdered in 1947.  To save bullets, Taiwanese who were rounded up were tied together; then one was shot in the head and fell into the river dragging the other two with him so that they drowned.

For a factual record of the 228 Massacre, we recommend starting with reading Formosa Betrayed by George H. Kerr, who provides eye witness accounts of that event.

China moving further away from democracy, threatening Taiwan

Beijing threatens freedom in Taiwan

By Nat Bellocchi 白樂崎

(Sept. 30, 2013 in Taipei Times)

During this year’s hot summer, a document was published that perhaps did not receive sufficient attention in Taiwan, where people were preoccupied with a number of domestic issues.

The publication of “Document No. 9” in Beijing was revealed in a New York Times article on Aug. 19 headlined “China takes aim at Western ideas,” by Chris Buckley.

Buckley describes how under Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) Beijing is working hard to eradicate the “seven perils” that endanger the grip of the Chinese Communist Party on society. This campaign against “Western ideas” is actually an extension of Xi’s “Chinese dream.”

Glancing through the list of perils in the document, these perils seem to represent the core values of democracy, freedom and human rights as they are known in the US and Europe. They also represent the values that Taiwanese fought so hard to achieve in their transition to democracy in the 1980s and 1990s.

First on the list is “Western constitutional democracy.” Then follows the promotion of “universal values” of human rights, Western-inspired notions of media independence and civil society, pro-market “neo-

liberalism” and a few others.

So, it seems Xi’s government is determined to totally eradicate these values This runs contrary to the expectations of many that Xi would be a reformer: He seems to be moving China further away from democracy.

What does this mean for Taiwan and its cross-strait policies? What would this mean for Taiwan’s democracy, freedom and human rights if it moved closer to China? It is clear that closer relations with China means Taiwan will lose much of its freedom.

If Taiwan wants to preserve its “status quo” as a free, prosperous and democratic nation, it should keep a safe political, economic and social distance from this China. Yes, Taiwan can and should have contact, communication and consultations with Beijing, but this could be done from a position of strength.

In addition, these contacts should take place with a clear understanding of the direction in which China is heading. If the country is moving in the direction of a freer society, it would be good to stimulate cross-strait communication, but “Document No. 9” makes the ultimate goals of China’s rulers clear. Under these circumstances, Taiwan’s people and government should exercise caution in dealing with Beijing.

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China's products dangerous and detrimental to Taiwanese

Economic Integration/ Cooperation with China, though allowing a minority to get rich quick, has been detrimental to the majority of Taiwan's people, endangering them with unsafe Chinese products again and again.  What will happen when one day the KMT regime insists for the sake of its one China principle no longer requiring labels that distinguish what comes from China and what comes from Taiwan?

Relying on tips to confiscate dangerous products such as that of imported bell peppers is not enough.  What about all the products that came through without anyone tipping off the FDA?

July 19, 2013:

"Food and Drug Administration (FDA) tests for residual pesticide on Chinese bell peppers confiscated from shipments in mid-May confirm that they did not meet Taiwanese safety standards, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said.

It said its harbor branch in Chiayi County’s Putai Township (布袋) received an anonymous tip alleging that six import firms were trying to exploit a window in domestic bell pepper production by importing bell peppers grown in Shandong Province, China.

The tipster said the importers knew the Chinese peppers might fail pesticide residue tests and so they would place produce more likely to pass inspection at the front of the cargo containers."

The Putai branch formed a taskforce to verify the tip, and conducted raids at the Greater Kaohsiung harbor on June 10, 12, 17 and 18, the Greater Taichung harbor on June 10 and Keelung harbor on June 18.

Eight cargo crates of bell peppers — totaling 110,000kg — were confiscated in the raids, coast guard officials said.

“FDA officials accompanying us on the raids took samples of the produce on-site and forwarded the samples to their labs for testing,” the CGA officials said.

According to the FDA, a majority of the bell peppers confiscated during the raid had excessive traces of pesticide, with Pyriproxyfen, Fipronil, alpha endosulfan, Chlorfenapyr and Burpirimate residue exceeding safety pesticide residual amount by up to 10 times.

The test also turned up traces ...  As the shipment of contaminated bell peppers was confiscated before it entered customs, none of the produce entered the local distribution chain, coast guard officials said."

Read More: Taipei Times article

Get young Taiwanese to watch this

Time to Upgrade Taiwan's Status

If Denmark and Finland can upgrade the status of Palestine to have a full embassy, how much more so is it time for them to upgrade Taiwan's status!

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From Taipei Times 2013/5/6:

Denmark and Finland plan to upgrade the status of their respective Palestinian representative offices in Copenhagen and Helsinki to that of an embassy, the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Saturday. “It is with satisfaction that we announce our joint intention to work with the Palestinians to be able to upgrade the status of the Palestinian missions in Copenhagen and Helsinki,” the foreign ministers of Finland and Denmark, Villy Soevndal and Erkki Tuomioja, said in a joint statement.

The changes are expected to be implemented sometime this year, it said. The move would “not entail a formal bilateral recognition of a sovereign Palestinian state by Denmark and Finland,” the statement said. “Palestine is in a phase of state-building, and many challenges remain for [Palestinian] President [Mahmud] Abbas to handle before we can recognize Palestine formally as a state,” it said. “But it is important to keep focused on the aim of Palestine becoming a fully recognized state and as such claim its rightful place as part of the international community of states.”

[But how about Taiwan?]

In November last year, Denmark and Finland backed a resolution recognizing the Palestinians as a non-member observer state at the UN.

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Support the Taiwan Policy Act


Washington D C - April 25th 2013


FAPA Applauds Unanimous Passage of Taiwan Policy Act (TPA) in House Subcommittee



(Washington, D.C.   April 25th 2013) -- Today the Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific of the United States House of Representatives unanimously passed HR419, aka the Taiwan Policy Act (TPA). 



The TPA was introduced on January 25, 2013 by Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL) and co-chairs of the Congressional Taiwan Caucus Reps. Mario Diaz-Balart (R-FL), Gerald Connolly (D-VA), John Carter (R-TX) and Albio Sires (D-NJ) "to strengthen and clarify the commercial, cultural, and other relations between the people of the United States and the people of Taiwan." 



 It is a comprehensive bill that addresses over a dozen different aspects of the U.S.-Taiwan relationship, and updates the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act (TRA) to reflect the new realities in this U.S.-Taiwan relationship. The TPA builds on the TRA (which has functioned effectively as the cornerstone of US-Taiwan relations over the past three decades). It does not amend or supersede the TRA. 



The TPA had been introduced during the previous 112th Congress, was passed by the House Foreign Affairs Committee but did not make it to the floor by the time Congress adjourned for the year in the fall of 2012. 



 During the April 25 markup hearing, the following 8 Representatives attended the hearing: Steve Chabot (R-OH), Eni Faleomavaega (D-SA), Ileana Ros Lehtinen (R-FL), Mo Brooks (R-AL), Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA), Doug Collins (R-GA), Scott Perry (R-PA), Ami Bera (D-CA). 



Chairman Chabot stated: "This bill strengthens the relations of our two nations. And I want to emphasize "Two Nations" for Taiwan is a democracy, an old friend and ally, and it deserves to be treated as such by the U.S. government." Rep. Faleomavaega said: "Reason why we pass this Act, is that we want to achieve that the leaders of Taiwan can continue to practice their democracy." 



Rep. Rohrabacher emphasized that Taiwan is a free and independent country. Rep. Perry: "I believe we should break through the barrier of conventional wisdom in our relations with Taiwan and work towards the normalization of relations." Rep. Ros-Lehtinen concluded: "Taiwan continues to be such an essential alley to the United States. This bill reiterates our support, and tells the Taiwanese people just how deeply we value that friendship." 



FAPA President Mark Kao, Ph.D. says: "This bill is one of the most significant pieces of legislation to address U.S.-Taiwan relations over the past decade and, if passed, will greatly bolster Taiwan's ability to preserve its freedom of action in the international community." 



 Dr. Kao concluded: "Next, the bill has to pass the House Foreign Affairs Committee, then the floor of the House to be followed by introduction in the Senate where the bill has to follow a similar path. We at FAPA will mobilize all our members all over the United States on the grassroots level to help ensure that this critically important bill becomes law at the earliest opportunity."