COA (Council of Agriculture) Minister Chen Wu-hsiung told at the year-end press conference
on December 31, 2009 that the most significant administrative achievements of the COA in this
year had been the widespread public acceptance of quality agriculture, active involvement in
post-Typhoon Morakot rescue and relief efforts and reconstruction work, and outstanding
accomplishments of agricultural technological research and development. The COA in 2010 will
focus on ensuring agricultural products safety to protect the interests of both producers and
consumers, formulating countermeasures in response to climate changes' impact on agriculture,
and fully implementing the agreements on recruiting mainland Chinese fishing crew and
agricultural product quarantine inspection cooperation so that domestic agriculture and farmers
can get more benefits and greater space for further development.

The two agreements were signed by Dr. Pin-kung Chiang, chairman of the Straits Exchange
Foundation (SEF), and his counterpart, Mr. Yunlin Chen, president of the Association for
Relations Across the Taiwan Strait (ARATS), on December 22, 2009 in Taichung City, central Taiwan.

When asked whether special projects of importing mainland Chinese agricultural products violated
the government policy that puts 830 items of mainland agricultural products under control,
Minister Chen explained that large quantities of field corns had been specially imported from
China in the past few years in response to feed material shortage as a result of corn price
hikes in the international market. Because the domestic livestock industry was desperately in
need of the feed material, the COA had approved the special import of corns from China. The several
other special projects were mainly importing plant seedlings given at the time local governments
entered into sisterhood ageements with mainland cities as well as edible bamboos for the two pandas
China gave Taiwan, but the import amounts were too small to adversely affect Taiwan's agriculture,
Chen added.

And when asked to comment on a proposed referendum on American beef imports, the minister noted that the referendum initiated by the Chinese Taipei Consumers' Foundation has won the support of a lot of people, but many arguments in the foundation's statement of reasons are actually
inconsistent with facts and thus have misled the supporters. He expressed the hope that debates
about the American beef issue will be held on the rational basis of scientific facts.

Chen said the COA rented a total of 2,580 hectares of farmland in the past year while promoting
the "small landlord and large tenant" program in combination with measures to revitalize fallow
land. Large tenants have increased their farmland by an average of about 12.7 hectares, 12 times
the average 1.1-hectare land owned by Taiwan farmers. The COA achievements also included the
promotion of organic agriculture with an aggregate certified area of 2,923 hectares; encouraging
reasonable application of fertilizers with the prices for 13 commonly used fertilizers being
lowered to the levels before price increases in May 2008; Taiwan ornamental fish won prizes in
international shows held in Duisburg, Germany and Japan; and expansion of Taiwanese agricultural
product exports to mainland China by grabbing the commercial opportunities created by cross-strait
direct flights. Besides, agricultural science and technology research and development earned
NT$71.38 million from technology transfers, a growth of 22% as compared with NT$58.45 million
earned in 2008; and Taiwan won 39 agricultural intellectual property rights in 2009, including
25 patents and 14 plant variety rights.

After central and southern Taiwan being heavily damaged by torrential rains brought by Typhoon
Morakot with agriculture suffering losses of more than NT$19.4 billion, the COA had started
immediately to dispose of dead livestocks, poultry and fish as well as driftwood and barrier
lakes; took measures to rescue farmers and fishermen in the disaster areas and helped
post-disaster rehabilitation work, providing agricultural financing assistance and promoting
agricultural reconstruction programs. Under the strategic principle of national land conservation,
the COA will guide agricultural reconstruction towards the development of economy of scale and
transformation, striving for the goal of restoring production functions and stabilizing farm
produce production and marketing.

Minister Chen pointed out that in response to global economic and trade liberlization and unusual
climate changes, the COA has listed "farm product safety" and "responding to climate changes'
impact on agriculture" as the key administrative focus in 2010. The Council will establish a
seamless agricultural product safety management system, strengthening the safety
management of farm produce from production to consumers through various channels; promote the
reduction of agricultural greenhouse gas emissions, increase afforestation to decrease carbon,
set up a system to evaluate the potentiality of weather-caused agricultural disasters, select and
breed crop varieties which can grow in adverse circumstances, encourage the revitalization of
fallow land, and stablize grains production; and convene a national agricultural conference to
discuss such issues as agricultural response to climate changes. In addition, the COA will fully
implement the fruitful results of the fourth round negotiations between Dr. Pin-kung Chiang and
Mr. Yunlin Chen, promoting the subsequent work after the signing of the agreements on cross-strait
fishing crew and agricultural product qurantine inspection cooperation.