The Ministry of Science and Technology is to boost scientific facilities on the Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) and Itu Aba Island (Taiping Island, 太平島), and increase collaborations with Southeast Asian countries, a ministry official said yesterday.
Minister of Science and Technology Chen Liang-gee (陳良基) on Friday led a delegation of 64 government officials and researchers to inspect facilities on Pratas, and meet with US and Japanese scientists.
The inspection is part of the ministry’s four-year Integrated Program for Intelligent Prevention of Natural Disasters and International Cooperative Research on Earth Sciences in Southeast Asia, which began last month and runs through 2022, Department of Natural Sciences and Sustainable Development Director-General Wu Chun-chieh (吳俊傑) said.
Photo: Copy by Tsai Ching-hua, Taipei Times
The program — composed of four subsidiary projects — aims to boost the nation’s atmospheric, maritime, Earth science and disaster prevention research efforts on and around the islands, and to share technologies with countries included in the government’s New Southbound Policy, Wu said.
First, the ministry plans to enhance research equipment at the scientific research station on Pratas, as well as improve its maintenance and support systems, with National Sun Yat-sen University professor of oceanography Soong Ker-yea (宋克義) serving as project head, Wu said.
Humanities researchers were part of the inspection, with an eye to inspiring new research based on the island’s extraordinary social and cultural conditions, he said.
On Itu Aba, the ministry is seeking to advance atmospheric observations by upgrading surface-based observation infrastructure, installing new cloud observation facilities and launching more climate data-gathering equipment, with National Taiwan University Department of Atmospheric Science chair Lin Po-Hsiung (林博雄) leading the project, Wu said.
The third project is to share the nation’s disaster prevention and early-warning systems for earthquakes with Southeast Asian countries, given that “Taiwan is a leader in disaster prevention studies in the region,” Wu said, adding that the project would be managed by National Science and Technology Center for Disaster Reduction Director Hongey Chen (陳宏宇).
Through the fourth project, the ministry plans to fortify connections between Taiwanese and Southeast Asian academics, and foster student and expert exchanges, with Academia Sinica Institute of Earth Sciences director Chung Sun-lin (鍾孫霖) leading the project, Wu said.
Hopefully, the projects would enlarge the nation’s presence on the global stage and lead to more bilateral and multilateral collaborations, Wu said, adding that the ministry is focused on scientific research and collaborations, not political issues.
The ministry is to share research findings with scientists working for Year of the Maritime Continent, a two-year project that began last year to study the climate of the Earth’s largest archipelago, which stretches from the Indian Ocean to the Pacific Ocean, Wu said, adding that Taiwan contributes by sharing observations collected on Itu Aba and Pratas.
Taiwanese actress Barbie Hsu (徐熙媛) has died of pneumonia at the age of 48 while on a trip to Japan, where she contracted influenza during the Lunar New Year holiday, her sister confirmed today through an agent. "Our whole family came to Japan for a trip, and my dearest and most kindhearted sister Barbie Hsu died of influenza-induced pneumonia and unfortunately left us," Hsu's sister and talk show hostess Dee Hsu (徐熙娣) said. "I was grateful to be her sister in this life and that we got to care for and spend time with each other. I will always be grateful to
UNITED: The premier said Trump’s tariff comments provided a great opportunity for the private and public sectors to come together to maintain the nation’s chip advantage The government is considering ways to assist the nation’s semiconductor industry or hosting collaborative projects with the private sector after US President Donald Trump threatened to impose a 100 percent tariff on chips exported to the US, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said yesterday. Trump on Monday told Republican members of the US Congress about plans to impose sweeping tariffs on semiconductors, steel, aluminum, copper and pharmaceuticals “in the very near future.” “It’s time for the United States to return to the system that made us richer and more powerful than ever before,” Trump said at the Republican Issues Conference in Miami, Florida. “They
TAIWAN DEFENSE: The initiative would involve integrating various systems in a fast-paced manner through the use of common software to obstruct a Chinese invasion The first tranche of the US Navy’s “Replicator” initiative aimed at obstructing a Chinese invasion of Taiwan would be ready by August, a US Naval Institute (USNI) News report on Tuesday said. The initiative is part of a larger defense strategy for Taiwan, and would involve launching thousands of uncrewed submarines, surface vessels and aerial vehicles around Taiwan to buy the nation and its partners time to assemble a response. The plan was first made public by the Washington Post in June last year, when it cited comments by US Indo-Pacific Commander Admiral Samuel Paparo on the sidelines of the Shangri-La Dialogue
REMINDER: Of the 6.78 million doses of flu vaccine Taiwan purchased for this flu season, about 200,000 are still available, an official said, following Big S’ death As news broke of the death of Taiwanese actress and singer Barbie Hsu (徐熙媛), also known as Big S (大S), from severe flu complications, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and doctors yesterday urged people at high risk to get vaccinated and be alert to signs of severe illness. Hsu’s family yesterday confirmed that the actress died on a family holiday in Japan due to pneumonia during the Lunar New Year holiday. CDC Deputy Director-General Tseng Shu-hui (曾淑慧) told an impromptu news conference that hospital visits for flu-like illnesses from Jan. 19 to Jan. 25 reached 162,352 — the highest
RSS