[From Farm Safety to Food Safety, County and City Mayors Please Answer] Yilan: Genetically Modified Soybeans to Be Withdrawn from Schools Next Year, Subsidies for Farmers Transitioning to Organic Zones, Farmhouse Construction Restricted in Sensitive Areas
"From Agricultural Safety to Food Safety, Ask the County and City Mayors" series, third stop: Newmarket took a trip to Yilan County, with its fine mountains and waters. Compared with other counties and cities, this year's Yilan County magistrate election was almost without suspense. Lin Tsung-hsien of the Democratic Progressive Party won re-election smoothly, with 160,000 votes, setting the record for the highest vote count for a Yilan County magistrate. But at the same time, when he met with the newly elected Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je this month, he stated his support for the shortest route for the Taipei-Yilan Direct Railway, passing through Feitsui Reservoir, which made him an overnight media focus.
"Transportation" has always been an important issue in Yilan. In an exclusive interview with Newmarket, Lin Tsung-hsien once again reiterated that the Hsuehshan Tunnel often has traffic jams on holidays, and the people of Yilan need the Taipei-Yilan railway, but last time he only raised the issue, and it still needs to go through an environmental impact assessment. He hopes more people will join the discussion.
After the Hsuehshan Tunnel opened in 2006, Yilan has on average "grown" 600 farmhouses each year. Farmland is priced by the ping and can reach tens of millions, so people who truly want to farm cannot afford farmland. The accompanying problems of household wastewater and farmland fragmentation have also affected local crops and ecology.
For this reason, Yilan County has successively created many nationwide firsts in ordinances, including requiring farmhouses to install their own purification ponds, and enacting the Yilan County Organic Agriculture Promotion Self-Governance Ordinance. Lin Tsung-hsien pointed out that in the future it is planned to require that environmentally sensitive areas may not have farmhouses built, to designate production zones and residential zones, to concentrate farmhouses, and to tighten water quality control, so that all water discharged into irrigation and drainage ditches must meet irrigation water standards. He also called on the central government to cooperate, hoping to amend the law to limit landowners to building a farmhouse only once in their lifetime.
Regarding the school lunch policy, in addition to eating organic rice and organic vegetables on alternating weeks, Yilan County will, starting next year, require group meal operators in bidding contracts to fully use non-GMO soy products. It is the first county or city in Taiwan to clearly set a timetable for GMOs to exit campuses.
To encourage farmers to grow organic vegetables, the Yilan County Government will also, in accordance with the organic self-governance ordinance, give priority to high-quality farmland upstream of the Lanyang River to designate organic zones, and subsidize the income gap for farmers transitioning from conventional to organic production. As for the county's numerous friendly agricultural products, Lin Tsung-hsien said that the county government will soon announce the "Yilan Strictly Selected" three-level label, with the county government setting friendly agricultural product standards, conducting free field inspections for farmers, and opening a recommended list to promote to group meal operators, to make up for the shortage of organic vegetables.
Newmarket has specially compiled Lin Tsung-hsien's policies related to agriculture, food, and school lunches, summarized below.
GMO soybeans to fully exit campuses next year
Q:Yilan County began promoting organic rice and organic vegetables in school lunches last October, but school lunches at Taiwan's elementary and junior high schools are generally too cheap and cannot reflect prices. Is the county government considering adjusting the school lunch system? The heads of Taipei City, Tainan City, Kaohsiung City and others have all signed commitment letters on "using non-GMO ingredients in school lunches". Does the Yilan County Government have any goals and related supporting measures for GMO foods exiting campuses?
A: First, starting from the management level, the Yilan Irrigation Association currently conducts fixed sampling inspections every year, and the Environmental Protection Bureau is also drafting a plan to tighten wastewater quality standards for discharge into non-urban planning areas. The current central standards are relatively low; as long as they meet effluent standards, we will require that wastewater discharged into farmland irrigation and drainage ditches must meet irrigation water standards.
The second part is construction. We have already held several meetings with the building development association and the architects' association, requiring newly built residences to increase the level of wastewater and sewage treatment.
The third is to draft the Yilan County Self-Governance Ordinance on the Installation of Secondary Purified Water Circulation Treatment Facilities for Farmhouses Built on Agricultural Land. Farmhouses must have their own ecological purification pond of at least 7 ping to treat household wastewater, and the treated water must also meet irrigation water standards. This ordinance has already been sent to the council and is still queued for review. We hope to find a way to pass it in the next session.
County government cooperates with universities and pharmaceutical company laboratories to test food
Q:Food safety scandals keep occurring. I wonder what the funding and manpower situation is at the Yilan County Health Bureau, and whether additional resources are needed?
Current food safety problems often come from poor management at the central source, forcing local governments to spend a lot of manpower on gatekeeping, but food safety is too diverse, so downstream health bureaus can only act passively. Therefore, I think the contents must be clearly labeled so consumers can also help with gatekeeping. If consumers have doubts, they can come to the health bureau to ask.
After the plasticizer incident, we have also continuously expanded testing equipment. In the past we could not detect plasticizers, but now we have secured funding from the central government to upgrade, though it still has not reached laboratory grade, so we will sign agreements with Yilan University and pharmaceutical companies to support each other's testing equipment.
Q: You once discussed the Taipei-Yilan Direct Railway development project with the newly elected Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je. It is expected to pass through Feitsui Reservoir, which sparked heated discussion. Some civil groups believe that the opening of the Hsuehshan Tunnel has already greatly shortened the travel time from Taipei to Yilan. What is your view on this?
A: Although the Hsuehshan Tunnel has already opened, traffic jams are still likely on holidays. As the crowds increase, Yilan County still needs this railway.
However, the last meeting with Mayor Ko Wen-je was only an exchange of views. Whether and how the final decision is made is not up to us alone; it still has to go through an environmental impact assessment. But because the Ministry of Transportation is now about to choose an option, we hope there will be more discussion. At present it is only at the stage of being raised, and everyone can discuss it together.
Note: County and city heads will hand over on the 25th of this month. Some heads have already drafted their smallcabinet lists. At that time it will be possible to examine one by one how the elected officials implement their food safety policy commitments. Newmarket will continue to track this, and readers are also welcome to leave comments below the article about the governance of their local county and city heads. We will forward them to each county and city head for reference.