A quartet of foreign YouTubers invited to tour Taiwan for a week as part of a government-funded promotional campaign has generated more than 35 million views, a Ministry of Foreign Affairs official said yesterday.
The ministry had invited Internet celebrities from two of the nation’s diplomatic allies — Paraguay and Guatemala — and one each from the Czech Republic and Israel to travel around Taiwan from March 16 to 22, Department of International Information Services Director-General Catherine Hsu (徐詠梅) said.
The four visited the Taipei 101 Building, Dadaocheng — the historical former trading port of Taipei — and Hualien County to experience Taiwanese aboriginal culture, cuisine and tea culture, Hsu said.
Photo courtesy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
The YouTubers from the two ally nations also enjoyed Guatemalan coffee and Paraguayan beef rolls with Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍).
Meanwhile, the Czechia and Israeli YouTubers joined Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Francois Wu (吳志中) in visiting the Taipei Mandarin Experimental Elementary School to learn about a pen pal program the Taipei school has with an Israeli elementary school and to enjoy a round of traditional Czechia music performance by the school’s Chinese orchestra, she added.
During and after their week-long visit to Taiwan, the four YouTubers released more than 200 social media posts on their respective social media platforms, attracting more than 35 million views in total to date, the official said.
The viewership proves that the ministry’s ongoing campaign inviting foreign Internet celebrities to Taiwan to promote the country globally has been a success and the ministry will continue to do so, Hsu said.
The campaign aims to zero in on an audience that is different from those reading traditional news media, and to expand people’s, including the young, understanding and awareness of Taiwan, Hsu added.
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