Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

Banana farmers have suffered great losses because of recent imbalances in supply and demand. President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration failed to prevent the surplus from occurring and to adequately resolve the problem once it became apparent. Ma merely asked farmers why they had not told him sooner about the surplus, while the Council of Agriculture was left with no choice but to export the surplus to China.

Witnessing the government’s helplessness, Shandong Province Governor Jiang Daming (姜大明), who was on a visit to Taiwan, took advantage of the situation to announce that Shandong would purchase 5,000 tonnes of bananas. China’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait Deputy Chairman Zheng Lizhong (鄭立中), who visited Taiwan last month, said he hoped to set up a procurement center in Taiwan and a sales center in China to simplify the intermediary process and guarantee farmers’ profits.

Since President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) launched his re-election campaign, he has not been able to stop bragging about how great cross-strait relations are. However, the breach of the Taiwan Strait centerline by two Chinese fighter jets is putting the Ma administration’s China policy to the test.

When two People’s Liberation Army Sukhoi-27 fighters crossed the centerline in their alleged pursuit of a US U-2S high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft a few days ago, the two Su-27s did not return to Chinese airspace until they were intercepted by two Taiwanese F-16 aircraft.

Following media reports, the Ministry of National Defense confirmed the incident, saying it was in “full control” of the situation.