Twenty years of afforestation was destroyed. Taiwan Sugar plans to cut down 200 hectares of trees to change to "Optoelectronics Park". Folks of Wanluan: putting the cart before the horse.

7 shared

Pingtung's beautiful mountain highway, located at the foot of Mount Tawu, has been planted on 5,000 hectares of flat land for 20 years, and runs from Fangliao to Gaoshu in the south. It is an ecological tourism section that the local area is proud of. Recently, the landlord Taiwan Sugar is expected to cut down 200 hectares of trees and change it into a "photoelectric zone", triggering strong local protests.

Yesterday (18) held the first public hearing coordination, Taiwan Sugar Company said that in order to develop green energy planning "farming photovoltaic"(Note), photovoltaic panels to maintain agricultural land, will not impact the existing environment. Wanluan villagers hold an opposing opinion, arguing that 20 years of afforestation already contains water, clean air, biological habitat value, cutting down trees to plant electricity does not match the value of energy transformation. The meeting ended in a deadlock without consensus. Taiwan Sugar said it would collect opinions and redraft it. Lin Kuo-shun, head of Wanluan County, asked Taiwan Sugar to give up and not say much.

Lin Guoshun, head of Wanluan County, took the lead in expressing local opposition._Lin Jiyang photographed the green road along the mountain. Five thousand hectares of afforestation in 20 years

Highway 185 in Pingtung County, also known as the "Mountain-side Highway," winds through the wilderness, passing through Minnan Village, Hakka Village and Yuanxiang Tribes, becoming a famous highway travel route. Local governments have formed the Mountain-side Highway Tourism Strategy Development Alliance to promote community eco-tourism.

The success of the highway along the mountain can be attributed to the successful movement to protect agricultural land in the past. In order to prevent the loss of good agricultural land along the line by arbitrary development, Cao Qihong coordinated the afforestation of 5,000 hectares of land under the advice of the civil environmental protection group, resulting in today's green highway scenery.

In order to meet the Executive Yuan's energy policy and the demand for electricity growth, Taiwan Sugar Corporation has planned to launch a number of photovoltaic zones in Pingtung since the end of last year. Among them, Taiwan Sugar Corporation has 650 hectares of farmland in Wanluan Rural Township. Excluding 200 hectares leased to farmers to grow pineapples, Taiwan Sugar Corporation expects to select 200 hectares of land with poor forest conditions from the original afforestation land and launch several agricultural photovoltaic zones.

On February 18, TSC held the first local explanation meeting at Wanluan Township Office. Liang Yiu-kuang, head of the Biomass Energy Assessment and Development Group of TSC, briefed the planning unit on the plan. The villagers and local organizations all opposed the plan, believing that the beautiful green highway would be wasted due to the green energy development plan.

(Photo/Lin Jiyang) Taiwan Sugar: The agricultural photovoltaic system will maintain agricultural land without impacting the existing environment.

Yuan Shu-mei, manager of Liyang, which was commissioned by Taiwan Sugar to plan the project, points out that in the past economic forests were planted in order to retain farmland, and the agricultural photovoltaic zone was designed to restore farmland and green energy, which was beneficial to environmental protection. Yuan said that the economic forest originally planted has reached the age of felling, due to poor growth conditions and planting Casuarina equisetifolia, Melaleuca, Terminalia plums, yellow peel and other windproof trees are also insufficient economic benefits.

She stressed that if the photovoltaic park is developed in the future, the environmental protection forests and bicycle lanes on both sides of the road will be retained, and only areas with poor forest conditions will be selected for development. The agricultural photovoltaic zone is to restore the afforestation land to agricultural land instead of destroying agricultural land, and will cooperate with the returning youth farmers or farmers 'groups to promote agricultural development.

Yuan Shumei said that the management and maintenance of photovoltaic panels during the 20-year period will also employ local residents to operate the place continuously. She stressed that the existing tourism and leisure functions and flood prevention functions will be implemented in future planning, and agricultural photovoltaic will also become the future environmental education field.

Taiwan Sugar Company attends on behalf of renewable energy group Liang Yaoguang_Lin Jiyang shooting local opinion: cut down trees to plant electricity, put the cart before the horse, residents suffer before they benefit

Lin Kuo-sheng, head of Wanluan Township, says that in the past, local villagers were mobilized by the Forestry Bureau to participate in the afforestation of the flat land for 20 years, and they have an emotional investment in this large area of forest. Today, the forest is beautiful, and the local people see the value of the forest as an asset for the development of community tourism, and will definitely not accept the logging development plan.

Lin Kuo-shun said: "Taiwan Sugar Land is state-owned, owned by the whole people, land use must respect the villagers, cutting down trees to plant electricity is putting the cart before the horse, the people of the whole country suffer before they benefit." He also questioned that Taiwan Sugar is only a public institution that manages state-owned land. The development of photovoltaic power belongs to a higher level decision-making, but there is no representative present and there is no sincerity in communication. If it is only policy propaganda, there is no need.

"I almost shed tears when I heard about this project," said Hsu Feng-chu, Director General of the Alliance for Tourism Development along the Mountain Highway."It took more than 20 years for the community to build such a beautiful place. Community development calls for owl eco-experiences that touch many