The Reality and Hope of Agriculture: A Series of Lectures on Small Farmers, Big Eats at National Taiwan University
Small Farmers, Big Eats @ NTU Lecture Series
Seeing the Reality and Hope of Agriculture
"The country with the most expensive farmland in the world"
"Rural aging - the thousand-year-old brigade"
"Romantic young people returning home to farm (or not)?"
"Vegetables are dirt cheap, vegetables are worth their weight in gold"
"Agriculture survives entirely on subsidies!"
"There's no future in farming!"
These are the popular impressions about agriculture that we have all heard, most of them leaning pessimistic and negative. But agriculture has many faces, and there are still many people working hard between the city and the countryside for Taiwan's agriculture and rural areas.
The Small Farmers, Big Eats @ NTU series features four wonderful lectures, covering rural labor shortages, agricultural organizations, the local poultry industry, and young people returning home to farm. For each topic we have invited the speakers with the richest frontline practical experience, guaranteeing that you will see an agriculture you never knew before, and guaranteeing that you will get to ask all the questions you want. We will present the harsh realities of agricultural management, and also show you that Taiwan's agriculture still has a vibrant future.
See the problems, understand the difficulties, but hold on to confidence. Let us work together to find a future for Taiwan's agriculture, farmers, rural areas, and farmland.
Small Farmers, Big Eats @ NTU Lecture Series Session Information
| Time | Location | Topic | Speaker |
| September 18 (Tue) 19:00-21:00 | National Taiwan University Freshman Teaching Building, Classroom 204 | Great fortune, great profit, tonight we eat chicken - Discussing Taiwan's free-range chicken industry | Yao Liang-yi (Chicken Farmer Brother) |
| September 25 (Tue) 19:00-21:00 | National Taiwan University Freshman Teaching Building, Classroom 301 | Can opening up to foreign migrant workers save agriculture from its labor shortage? | Wen Chung-liang (Executive Director, Meinong Rural Field Studies Association) |
| October 2 (Tue) 19:00-21:00 | National Taiwan University Freshman Teaching Building, Classroom 301 | Farmers' associations are not what you think! See how outstanding farmers' associations help farmers | Chang Yao-yu (Director of Planning and Auditing, Dounan Township Farmers' Association) |
| October 25 (Thu) 19:00-21:00 | National Taiwan University Freshman Teaching Building, Classroom 301 | Young man, are you sure you want to return home to farm? | Yang Yu-fan (Pineapple Prince) |
Topic One: Great fortune, great profit, tonight we eat chicken - Discussing Taiwan's free-range chicken industry
Time: September 18 (Tue) 19:00-21:00
Location: National Taiwan University Freshman Teaching Building, Classroom 204
Speaker: Yao Liang-yi (Chicken Farmer Brother)
Introduction: You have eaten chicken since you were little, but have you ever thought about what free-range chicken is? Does growing up in Taiwan make it a free-range chicken? Is there only one kind of free-range chicken? Who raises free-range chickens? How does a free-range chicken go from birth to your dinner table? Do free-range chickens taste better? Most importantly, does Taiwan's free-range chicken industry have a future? These questions are left to the "second-generation chicken farmer" Yao Liang-yi from Xianxi, Changhua, who has helped raise chickens at home since childhood. Let him take you through one class to understand Taiwan's free-range chicken industry.
Registration link
Topic Two: Can opening up to foreign migrant workers save agriculture from its labor shortage?
Time: September 25 (Tue) 19:00-21:00
Location: National Taiwan University Freshman Teaching Building, Classroom 301
Speaker: Wen Chung-liang (Executive Director, Meinong Rural Field Studies Association)
Introduction: Taiwan's agriculture faces a great many management difficulties, but when it comes to the most serious ones, the labor shortage is certainly among them. When young people are unwilling to farm and the young and middle-aged rural population moves away, the labor force agriculture needs becomes increasingly insufficient, seriously affecting the efficiency and schedule of farming. When manufacturing can openly hire migrant workers, why is agriculture still unable to open up to migrant workers? But perhaps what we should ask is: can opening up to foreign migrant workers really save agriculture from its labor shortage? And is opening up to migrant workers really the only solution to the agricultural labor shortage? The speaker for this discussion is Wen Chung-liang, Executive Director of the Meinong Rural Field Studies Association. Chung-liang, who has long assisted farmers and agricultural development in rural areas, understands the labor shortage situation very well, but can migrant workers save it? Listen to what he has to say.
Registration link
Topic Three: Farmers' associations are not what you think! See how outstanding farmers' associations help farmers
Time: October 2 (Tue) 19:00-21:00
Location: National Taiwan University Freshman Teaching Building, Classroom 301
Speaker: Chang Yao-yu (Director of Planning and Auditing, Dounan Township Farmers' Association)
Introduction: When people hear "farmers' association," many may not even know what it is, and some may even confuse it with the irrigation association. Some may frown and say, "I heard farmers' associations don't help farmers at all," "I heard farmers' associations are all corrupt," "I heard farmers' associations are just tools for securing votes, aren't they?" "I heard farmers' associations only have the credit department left to make money from loans." Enough with the hearsay. Do you know how this grassroots agricultural cooperative organization, if run well, can help farmers? Taiwan has quite a few outstanding farmers' associations. This time, let one of the best among them, Director Chang Yao-yu of the Planning and Auditing Department of the Dounan Township Farmers' Association, overturn your stereotypes about farmers' associations!
Registration link
Topic Four: Young man, are you sure you want to return home to farm?
Time: October 25 (Thu) 19:00-21:00
Location: National Taiwan University Freshman Teaching Building, Classroom 301
Speaker: Yang Yu-fan (Pineapple Prince)
Introduction: "I really want to go up there and pour cold water on it too." This was Yang Yu-fan's response when we invited him to talk about the topic of young people returning home to farm. Behind the glowing stories that the media have been hyping about young people returning home to farm and giving up a million-yuan salary to take up farming, what is not clearly stated is the greater difficulties and obstacles of farming, and even the "misery industry reality" of leaving in debt in the end. Yu-fan is also a young person who returned home to farm. Although he is now a self-produced, self-sold expert who sells over ten thousand jin of pineapples in one hour, the hardships along the road home are the least discussed by society. If he had the chance to say something to young people who want to return home to farm, what would he say? Come and listen.
Registration link