National defense spending in the government’s annual budget for next year stands at 2.34 percent of projected GDP, its lowest share since President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) took office in May 2008.
Under the draft budget proposal the Cabinet approved earlier this week, NT$312.3 billion (US$10.41 billion) is to be set aside for defense, an increase of NT$8 billion, or 2.7 percent, over this year, in stark contrast to the estimated double-digit growth in China’s defense budget in recent years.
In the draft budget, NT$441.6 billion is earmarked for social welfare projects, taking up the largest share of the projected expenditure of NT$1.959 trillion and accounting for 22.5 percent of total spending, followed by NT$385.6 billion in scientific, educational and cultural spending, or 19.7 percent.
Defense spending came in third, accounting for 15.9 percent of the projected expenditure.
In terms of GDP share, Ma’s administration has failed since 2011 to honor the president’s campaign promise to invest no less than 3 percent of GDP in national defense.
The percentage fell from 3.05 percent in the draft budget for the fiscal year of 2009 to 3 percent in 2010, 2.67 percent in 2011, 2.68 percent in 2012, 2.71 last year, 2.54 percent this year and 2.34 percent next year, an examination of the government’s draft budget statements showed.
Final-account reports for the years from 2009 to last year showed that the government’s actual defense spending each year failed to meet the 3 percent of GDP threshold, meaning that Ma’s pledge has not been fulfilled.
Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Tsai Huang-liang (蔡煌瑯) said that the administration’s failure to budget 3 percent of GDP for national defense is aimed at pleasing Beijing.
In the face of China’s consistently surging defense spending, the Ma administration has weakened the nation’s military capabilities, Tsai said.
What Ma’s administration has been doing is disarming the nation, limiting its self-defense capabilities, he said.
Since the military balance between Taiwan and China has tipped heavily in China’s favor, the threat to national security is a matter of grave concern, Tsai said.
The limited increase in the defense budget could further complicate the problem of insufficient recruitment of volunteer soldiers next year, he added.
Taiwan yesterday condemned the recent increase in Chinese coast guard-escorted fishing vessels operating illegally in waters around the Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) in the South China Sea. Unusually large groupings of Chinese fishing vessels began to appear around the islands on Feb. 15, when at least six motherships and 29 smaller boats were sighted, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said in a news release. While CGA vessels were dispatched to expel the Chinese boats, Chinese coast guard ships trespassed into Taiwan’s restricted waters and unsuccessfully attempted to interfere, the CGA said. Due to the provocation, the CGA initiated an operation to increase
A crowd of over 200 people gathered outside the Taipei District Court as two sisters indicted for abusing a 1-year-old boy to death attended a preliminary hearing in the case yesterday afternoon. The crowd held up signs and chanted slogans calling for aggravated penalties in child abuse cases and asking for no bail and “capital punishment.” They also held white flowers in memory of the boy, nicknamed Kai Kai (剴剴), who was allegedly tortured to death by the sisters in December 2023. The boy died four months after being placed in full-time foster care with the
CHANGING LANDSCAPE: Many of the part-time programs for educators were no longer needed, as many teachers obtain a graduate degree before joining the workforce, experts said Taiwanese universities this year canceled 86 programs, Ministry of Education data showed, with educators attributing the closures to the nation’s low birthrate as well as shifting trends. Fifty-three of the shuttered programs were part-time postgraduate degree programs, about 62 percent of the total, the most in the past five years, the data showed. National Taiwan Normal University (NTNU) discontinued the most part-time master’s programs, at 16: chemistry, life science, earth science, physics, fine arts, music, special education, health promotion and health education, educational psychology and counseling, education, design, Chinese as a second language, library and information sciences, mechatronics engineering, history, physical education
The Shanlan Express (山嵐號), or “Mountain Mist Express,” is scheduled to launch on April 19 as part of the centennial celebration of the inauguration of the Taitung Line. The tourism express train was renovated from the Taiwan Railway Corp’s EMU500 commuter trains. It has four carriages and a seating capacity of 60 passengers. Lion Travel is arranging railway tours for the express service. Several news outlets were invited to experience the pilot tour on the new express train service, which is to operate between Hualien Railway Station and Chihshang (池上) Railway Station in Taitung County. It would also be the first tourism service
RSS