Amendment to the Waste Disposal Act: any substance that causes pollution counts as waste.

For a long time, farmland backfilled with industrial furnace slag could not be properly handled, because slag was defined as a "product" rather than "waste" and therefore could not be handled under the Waste Disposal Act; but today (the 20th) the Legislative Yuan passed a draft amendment on first reading, so in the future anything that loses market value and may cause pollution will be "waste," and the Environmental Protection Administration can regulate it; if it can be reused, the relevant ministries should track it.

As for the most controversial waste in the past, which was jointly managed by more than 10 ministries but led to buck-passing with the Environmental Protection Administration, Legislator Lin Shu-fen originally proposed unifying authority and returning it to the Environmental Protection Administration, but because of funding, manpower and the great diversity of waste items, it currently cannot be fully placed under the Environmental Protection Administration's jurisdiction. She demanded that 14 categories of waste be taken back and managed by the Environmental Protection Administration, but in the future she will still propose amendments in the direction of unifying authority.

5. Higher fines, reducing the boldness of illegal operators

This amendment also adjusts many fine amounts. For example, failing to handle waste in accordance with designated regulations and causing death may be punished by fixed-term imprisonment of 7 years or more or life imprisonment, and a fine of up to 30 million yuan may be imposed concurrently; causing serious injury, such as loss of vision in one eye, hearing in one ear, one limb, smell, taste, etc., may be punished by 3 to 10 years imprisonment, with a concurrent fine of 25 million yuan. If it causes disease, it may be punished by 1 to 7 years imprisonment, with a concurrent fine of up to 20 million yuan.

At the same time, the new law also requires the Environmental Protection Administration to establish a fine formula based on the degree of pollution hazard, and when illegal profits exceed the statutory maximum fine, the penalty may be increased within the amount of the illegal profit.

However, if expired food flows back into the food chain, it can also be penalized under the Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation (abbreviated as the Food Safety Act), but expired food itself also counts as industrial waste. If it improperly flows into the food chain, will there be a legal applicability problem? Wu Sheng-chung said that at that time it would be handled by referring to the Food Safety Act and applying "choose one and choose the heavier."