The Taiwanese government's plan to curb cancer faces tough opposition: about 60,000 women who sit in roadside glass booths, often wearing little more than a bikini, selling the nation's oldest legal drug.
The so-called betel-nut beauties, who are unique to Taiwan, peddle the nation's second-largest crop to 17.5 percent of the adult male population, according to government estimates.
Chewing addictive betel nuts, the seed of the betel palm, increases the risk of mouth cancer, according to the Department of Health. Officials are encouraging farmers to plant alternatives to the US$359 million annual crop, urging about 1.6 million users to quit.
PHOTO: MAURICE TSAI, BLOOMBERG NEWS
"We aren't very optimistic," said Wu Chien-yuan (
Betel, or areca, nuts increase the heart rate and induce a mild sense of excitement, said Hahn Liang-jiunn (
As many as 400 million people from East Africa to Indonesia chew the seeds and leaves regularly, the British Medical Journal reported in April 2002.
Taiwan's beauties are even featured in tourist guides. Their betel-nut stands are a favorite among long-distance drivers.
"I use betel nuts to mark time and to keep myself alert," said Shen Ting-hui, 28, a truck driver from Taoyuan County, who has been chewing betel nuts for 10 years.
Paying a saleswoman dressed in a blue shirt, white shorts and white boots, Shen said the beauties' visual sales pitch encouraged him to buy from them.
"Of course I want to go to someone good-looking," he said.
While the government's goals are modest -- cutting the number of users by half a percentage point during the next four years -- the beauties are not.
`Government is stupid'
"Our government is stupid," said saleswoman Yu Hui-min, 38, dismissing the notion that betel nuts cause cancer. She wore a brown shirt and miniskirt and red high heels in her neon-lit booth in central Taipei.
"In my home town, betel nuts are a treat for guests," she said.
Betel-nut beauties emerged in the early 1990s as Taiwanese companies sought to cut labor costs by moving factories to China. Many of the beauties are unskilled workers who can't find better jobs because of that shift, said Robin Jai (翟本瑞), dean of social sciences at Nanhua University in Chiayi County.
Taiwan has more than 100,000 betel-nut booths, Jai said. Artist Christian Wu (
"With not much money, I can own my own business and wear beautiful clothes to work," said Lin Hsiao-wei, 35, who wore a leopard-print miniskirt as she dispensed betel nuts in the central town of Toufen (
"This is a good job," she said.
Lin, a former garment-factory worker, said she sells NT$8,000 to NT$9,000 of betel nuts a day. Her booth cost about NT$150,000 to set up and her profit margin ranges from 33 percent to 50 percent, she said.
Mouth cancer
People who chew betel nuts, drink alcohol and smoke cigarettes are 123 times more likely to get mouth cancer than those who don't, according to the Department of Health.
Mouth cancer killed about 15 of every 100,000 Taiwanese men in 2003, making it the fourth most lethal form of the disease, department figures show.
"There is sufficient scientific evidence that betel nuts can cause oral cancer," Hahn said. They also have been linked to asthma, diabetes and cancers of the esophagus and anus, he said.
A 2000 study of ethnic Indian users in London found that paan masala, a combination of spices and betel nut wrapped in a betel leaf, can be as addictive as cocaine, according to the British Medical Journal.
"Patients describe typical dependency symptoms, with difficulty in abstaining, withdrawal symptoms including headache and sweating, and need for a morning paan to relieve these symptoms," the 2002 Journal report said.
To combat the habit, the government is running anti-betel advertisements and education campaigns, including betel-nut prevention days.
Officials are also helping farmers to substitute orange and tangerine trees and Chinese herbs for betel crops.
Nut production declined 17 percent to 143,368 tonnes in 2004 from a peak of 172,574 tonnes six years earlier, according to the Council of Agriculture.
Still, the crop remains the country's second-largest, after rice, and affects the livelihood of 70,000 farming families, the council estimates.
Betel-nut sellers are coming under pressure, too. The police are stepping up inspections of betel-nut beauties for moral and safety reasons, said Patricia Huang, a spokeswoman at the Ministry of the Interior.
"Their revealing clothing may distract drivers and cause car accidents, as well as prompt male clients to harass or even sexually assault them," Huang said.
County officials are helping, closing down booths if they judge sellers' clothing to be too revealing, said Wang Yun-tsen, deputy director of economic development in Taoyuan County.
Taoyuan "is the main gate of our nation," Wang said.
The saleswomen "aren't a good subculture and we don't want people to use them to attract tourists."
Teng Chun-han, 28, a truck driver from Taoyuan, said the government should stop harassing the women, who are only trying to make ends meet.
He spends 12 hours a day on the road and uses betel nuts to stay alert, he said, paying a saleswoman wearing a short black dress and black boots.
"Eight out of 10 users will buy from betel-nut beauties," Teng said.
The US dollar was trading at NT$29.7 at 10am today on the Taipei Foreign Exchange, as the New Taiwan dollar gained NT$1.364 from the previous close last week. The NT dollar continued to rise today, after surging 3.07 percent on Friday. After opening at NT$30.91, the NT dollar gained more than NT$1 in just 15 minutes, briefly passing the NT$30 mark. Before the US Department of the Treasury's semi-annual currency report came out, expectations that the NT dollar would keep rising were already building. The NT dollar on Friday closed at NT$31.064, up by NT$0.953 — a 3.07 percent single-day gain. Today,
‘SHORT TERM’: The local currency would likely remain strong in the near term, driven by anticipated US trade pressure, capital inflows and expectations of a US Fed rate cut The US dollar is expected to fall below NT$30 in the near term, as traders anticipate increased pressure from Washington for Taiwan to allow the New Taiwan dollar to appreciate, Cathay United Bank (國泰世華銀行) chief economist Lin Chi-chao (林啟超) said. Following a sharp drop in the greenback against the NT dollar on Friday, Lin told the Central News Agency that the local currency is likely to remain strong in the short term, driven in part by market psychology surrounding anticipated US policy pressure. On Friday, the US dollar fell NT$0.953, or 3.07 percent, closing at NT$31.064 — its lowest level since Jan.
The New Taiwan dollar and Taiwanese stocks surged on signs that trade tensions between the world’s top two economies might start easing and as US tech earnings boosted the outlook of the nation’s semiconductor exports. The NT dollar strengthened as much as 3.8 percent versus the US dollar to 30.815, the biggest intraday gain since January 2011, closing at NT$31.064. The benchmark TAIEX jumped 2.73 percent to outperform the region’s equity gauges. Outlook for global trade improved after China said it is assessing possible trade talks with the US, providing a boost for the nation’s currency and shares. As the NT dollar
The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) yesterday met with some of the nation’s largest insurance companies as a skyrocketing New Taiwan dollar piles pressure on their hundreds of billions of dollars in US bond investments. The commission has asked some life insurance firms, among the biggest Asian holders of US debt, to discuss how the rapidly strengthening NT dollar has impacted their operations, people familiar with the matter said. The meeting took place as the NT dollar jumped as much as 5 percent yesterday, its biggest intraday gain in more than three decades. The local currency surged as exporters rushed to
RSS