Labour – Page 2 – Taiwan Insight

Maintaining Taiwan’s Global ICT industry lead by Improving Employee’s Training

4 November 2021 Editor

Written by Bo-Yi Lee. Employee training is critical in the success of organisations, including productivity, profitability, innovation capabilities and overall competitiveness. Due to the everlasting and intensifying global competition among firms, particularly in the ICT industry, the Taiwanese government has incentivised firms to build formal training systems. This includes establishing a training committee at the corporate level, creating skill development maps and building e-learning databases for employees. Thus, it will help employees catch up with predicament of ever-changing technologies. However, R&D engineers in the Taiwanese ICT industry rely much more on informal training to update their knowledge and skills in related technologies.

From Taiwan to Macau in 16 Years: A Domestic Worker’s Migration Biography

29 September 2021 Editor

Narrated by Yosa Wariyanti, written by Isabelle Cheng. I have spent a total of 16 years abroad. When we return home, we have our savings, and we may open businesses. But businesses do not always go well. It is difficult for us to find jobs because we do not have good education or professional certificates. No one would hire us. Soon my daughter will go to university. I want to give her a good education. I need to work for at least another five years to pay for her tuition fees. So, I will just go on, and on, and on working abroad.

Taiwan’s Perfect Storm: Covid Spikes, Water Shortages, and Power Outages

16 July 2021 Editor

Written by Denis Simon. In early 2021, Taiwan’s health care system was ranked number one globally for the third year in a row by NUMBEO’s Annual Online Survey. Its overall performance buoyed the island’s ability to consistently earn such a high ranking during the first 12-14 months of the Covid-19 global pandemic beginning in 2020. Taiwan officials initially were able to ward off any significant damage from the pandemic by pursuing a highly aggressive strategy to keep the virus at bay. While other international rankings, such as the World Index of Healthcare Innovation, do not rank Taiwan as number one in its rating system, there is consensus across the board internationally that the government has proven itself highly effective at managing its single-payer health care system, mainly due to its innovative approach to digital health records.

A Wake-Up Call to Improve Factory Working Procedures in a Time of Crisis

12 July 2021 Editor

Written by Chan-Yuan Wong, Ker-Hsuan Chien, and Mei-Chih Hu. As the world enters the second year of the Covid-19 pandemic crisis, Taiwan – previously acknowledged as a Covid-free nation – encountered a new outbreak in mid-May 2021. This wave of infection has been deemed critical, as the number of infection cases has surpassed 700, and the infectivity rate is as contagious as measles. To date, Taiwan encountered 635 death cases related to Covid-19 – of which 98% are attributed to the recent outbreak since 15 May 2021.

Not obedience but Dignity: A message from a former migrant worker

22 May 2021 Editor

Written by Iweng Karsiwen and Ratih Kabinawa. Edited by Isabelle Cheng. A former domestic worker in Hong Kong for over ten years, Iweng Karsiwen is currently the Chair of Families of Indonesian Migrant Workers (Kabar Bumi). Initially she was recruited to work in Taiwan when the door opened for Indonesian women seeking domestic work there. However, instead of going to Taiwan, Iweng found herself arriving at a Hong Kong MTR station late one evening a year later. Knowing how the brokering industry functioned at home and abroad, after returning to Indonesia, Iweng was determined to help those who worked abroad and who faced similar challenges at various stage of their migration. She has particularly campaigned to outlaw salary reduction. This, as well as other practices mentioned by Iweng, are commonly adopted by brokers in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Malaysia and Singapore.

POLITICAL CONTENTION TAKES PLACE IN AFTERMATH OF RAIL ACCIDENT

9 April 2021 Editor

Written by Brian Hioe. After a rail accident on Friday that left fifty dead and injured over 200, there has been much political contention between both the DPP and opposition parties such as the KMT. The railway accident was the deadliest accident in Taiwan in decades and took place after a truck from a construction site on a slope overlooking train tracks slid down a slope and crashed into a train exiting a tunnel near Hualien.

Attracting and Retaining Talent: Taiwan’s Challenges and Opportunities amid COVID-19

15 March 2021 Editor

Written by Michael C.Y. Lin. Taiwan’s success in battling the novel coronavirus has promoted its international image, attracting businesses, investment, and a skilled workforce to the country. These trends offer Taiwan a potential opportunity to deepen its talent pool. Over the past two decades, Taiwan has experienced stagnant real wage growth, driving out skilled domestic workers and discouraging overseas Taiwanese talent from returning to their homeland. In particular, talent outflow from Taiwan to China has raised serious concerns.

Prosecution of a Fraudulent Labour Agency in Taichung: An Insight on the Exploitation of Migrant Workers in Taiwan

23 February 2021 Editor

Written by Bonny Ling. On 28 January 2021, public prosecutors in Taichung indicted four individuals on charges of human trafficking, violations of the Employment Services Act and forgery of documents for their role in exploiting Vietnamese migrant workers in Taiwan. The four involved worked at the Hong Yu Employment Service Agency Company (弘宇人力仲介公司) in Taichung to recruit migrant workers from Vietnam. Established in 2017, Hong Yu placed 126 Vietnamese migrant workers in the construction sector around Taiwan from July 2018 to August 2020.

The Problem of Taiwan’s Lost-Contact Migrant Workers’ ‘Illicit Enjoyment’

12 January 2021 Editor

Written by Linh Le. Taiwan and its migrant workers are tangled in a bitter-sweet marriage: one needs another but cannot stand the flaws of the other. Like Director Tsai Tsung-lung’s attempt to show the human side of migrant workers through his latest documentary “Nine shots,” this article shares the same sentiment by highlighting these workers’ needs for leisure, enjoyment and entertainment like any other human being. However, these needs are rarely satisfied due to many unfortunate circumstances.

Protecting the ‘Orphans’: Advocacy Networks and Labour Movements in Taiwan

11 January 2021 Editor

Written by Ratih Kabinawa. In an attempt to raise awareness about the lives of marginalised groups in Taiwan, the Taiwan Studies Programme at the University of Nottingham, U.K., organised a movie screening and discussion – Migrant Lives Matter: ‘Nine Shots’ – that showcased the dark side of migrant labour recruitment and employment in Taiwan. The film reveals some perspectives from different stakeholders, including labour advocacy networks, in addressing problems related to Taiwan’s labour migration system. Using the movie as a prompt, this article explores various advocacy networks and migrant labour movements in Taiwan. Why and how do these networks emerge and organise themselves? What are their motivations and activities? And how do these networks advocate for policy change and work to build solidarity to empower migrant workers?

The Labor Market, Economic Insecurity, and Populism in Taiwan

6 January 2021 Editor

Written by Wei-Ting Yen. In the past few years, two political outsiders in Taiwan have quickly accumulated popularity and became serious political contenders in elections. One is Ko Wen-Je, currently the mayor of Taipei. The other one is Han Kuo-Yu, the recently impeached mayor of Kaohsiung, the second-largest city in Taiwan. Their rise has prompted the island nation to widely debate whether populism has grown its roots in Taiwan because Ko and Han share similar populist traits.

Imagining a Tragedy in Cyberspace: Online Postings after the Death of an Undocumented Migrant Worker

15 December 2020 Editor

Written by Isabelle Cheng. On 31 August 2017, Nguyen Quoc Phi, an undocumented Vietnamese worker, was shot dead by a policeman in Hsinchu, northern Taiwan. Public responses to Phi’s death were polarised between pro-police campaigners, who supported the police’s use of force, and human rights activists, who emphasised the plight of migrant workers who are exploited by brokers and employers and who are regulated by a hostile guest worker system. This polarisation is also evident in cyberspace. The reporting of Phi’s death in September 2017, the sentencing of the policeman in July 2019, and the deaths of George Floyd and Rayshard Brooks in the U.S. in May and June 2020 prompted Taiwanese netizens to comment on PTT.

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