A delegation comprising of members of the Taiwan Provincial Fishery Association (TPFA, 台灣省漁會) and legislators departed yesterday for Vietnam for talks on importing Vietnamese workers for Taiwan's fishing industry, which is facing a severe labor shortage crisis.
Prominent members of the delegation include TPFA Chairman Hsu Teh-hsiang (
According to Cheng -- elected from the northeastern county of Ilan, which is one of Taiwan's major fishing industry hubs -- the TPFA delegation was sent to Vietnam after the association learned from Vietnamese authorities that the Southeast Asian country will soon establish a fishermen training center aimed at providing fishermen to work aboard Taiwanese fishing vessels.
The Vietnamese plan comes at a crucial time after China recently banned fishing industry workers from working for Taiwanese fishing companies.
According to a rough estimate by the Council of Agriculture, Taiwan's deep-sea fishing vessels need about 25,000 fishermen and its offshore fishing boats need about 5,000 fishermen.
Cheng said that, if the private Taiwan-Vietnam fishery talks proceed smoothly, well-trained Vietnamese fishermen will probably come to Taiwan by June at the earliest.
Taiwan's fishery industry has been hard hit by the abrupt ban on Chinese labor which was imposed by Chinese authorities in February.
According to Cheng, approximately 5,000 Taiwanese fishing vessels have been forced to suspend their operations since China banned its nationals from working aboard Taiwanese boats on Feb. 12.
In addition to Taiwanese fishing boats having to suspend their operations, transactions in Taiwan's major fishery markets have also plummeted, resulting in a sharp decline in fishermen's incomes, Cheng said.
The ban, which has been seen as an attempt to force Taiwanese fishing-vessel owners to improve the working conditions of mainland fishermen, led to a visit to Beijing by a 15-member group in mid-March. The group was made up of TPFA officials and DPP legislator Chen Chin-teh (陳金德) and was sent to negotiate with the relevant mainland Chinese authorities over a lifting of the labor ban.
Taiwan has not heard a word from Beijing since the visit.
A Chinese freighter that allegedly snapped an undersea cable linking Taiwan proper to Penghu County is suspected of being owned by a Chinese state-run company and had docked at the ports of Kaohsiung and Keelung for three months using different names. On Tuesday last week, the Togo-flagged freighter Hong Tai 58 (宏泰58號) and its Chinese crew were detained after the Taipei-Penghu No. 3 submarine cable was severed. When the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) first attempted to detain the ship on grounds of possible sabotage, its crew said the ship’s name was Hong Tai 168, although the Automatic Identification System (AIS)
An Akizuki-class destroyer last month made the first-ever solo transit of a Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force ship through the Taiwan Strait, Japanese government officials with knowledge of the matter said yesterday. The JS Akizuki carried out a north-to-south transit through the Taiwan Strait on Feb. 5 as it sailed to the South China Sea to participate in a joint exercise with US, Australian and Philippine forces that day. The Japanese destroyer JS Sazanami in September last year made the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force’s first-ever transit through the Taiwan Strait, but it was joined by vessels from New Zealand and Australia,
CHANGE OF MIND: The Chinese crew at first showed a willingness to cooperate, but later regretted that when the ship arrived at the port and refused to enter Togolese Republic-registered Chinese freighter Hong Tai (宏泰號) and its crew have been detained on suspicion of deliberately damaging a submarine cable connecting Taiwan proper and Penghu County, the Coast Guard Administration said in a statement yesterday. The case would be subject to a “national security-level investigation” by the Tainan District Prosecutors’ Office, it added. The administration said that it had been monitoring the ship since 7:10pm on Saturday when it appeared to be loitering in waters about 6 nautical miles (11km) northwest of Tainan’s Chiang Chun Fishing Port, adding that the ship’s location was about 0.5 nautical miles north of the No.
SECURITY: The purpose for giving Hong Kong and Macau residents more lenient paths to permanent residency no longer applies due to China’s policies, a source said The government is considering removing an optional path to citizenship for residents from Hong Kong and Macau, and lengthening the terms for permanent residence eligibility, a source said yesterday. In a bid to prevent the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from infiltrating Taiwan through immigration from Hong Kong and Macau, the government could amend immigration laws for residents of the territories who currently receive preferential treatment, an official familiar with the matter speaking on condition of anonymity said. The move was part of “national security-related legislative reform,” they added. Under the amendments, arrivals from the Chinese territories would have to reside in Taiwan for
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