Hundreds of mudflat crabs busily move about in a grey, muddy and brackish wetland area stretching along the coastline from Fangyuan Township to Dacheng Township in Changhua County, central Taiwan. Species such as the mantis shrimp and mudskipper, a type of amphibious fish, can also be seen across the mudflats of the 4,000-hectare wetland, the largest in western Taiwan, while rare migratory birds such as the Eurasian curlew and Saunders’ gull wing past in winter. Meanwhile, oyster beds lie sprinkled across the shallows and the Chinese white dolphin leaps offshore.
All is not as idyllic as it might appear in this coastal area, however, as industrial development could threaten many of these animals. This part of Changhua County is therefore fast becoming a flashpoint where the forces of industrial development run headlong into environmentalists’ efforts to limit habitat loss, particularly for the local population of the Chinese white dolphin, which is also known as the Indo-Pacific humpback dolphin or Sousa chinensis.
Local fishermen call the white dolphin “Mazu’s fish,” since it is often spotted around the time of the birthday of the goddess Mazu, which falls on the 23rd day of the third month of the lunar calendar, or between March and April. Sousa chinensis is an unusual dolphin species because its skin color changes from grey to pink or white as it matures.
Dedicated Surveys
Taiwan’s variety is known as the Sousa chinensis (eastern Taiwan Strait) subpopulation and was first scientifically confirmed in 2002 as a result of dedicated cetacean surveys of the waters along the island’s west coast by the Formosa Cetus Research and Conservation Group. Although Sousa chinensis is also found near mainland China and Hong Kong, researchers believe that the eastern Taiwan Strait (ETS) subpopulation is genetically discrete and isolated from populations in the Pearl River and Jiulong River estuaries of mainland China.
The ETS subpopulation only inhabits waters less than 30 meters deep, while the average depth of the Taiwan Strait is 50 meters. “Thus, the subpopulation won’t swim across the strait and this could prove that they are an independent subpopulation,” explains Chen Chao-lun, an associate research fellow in the Biodiversity Research Center at Taipei’s Academia Sinica, Taiwan’s foremost research institute. John Wang, a member of the Cetacean Specialist Group under the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), as well as the Formosa Cetus Research and Conservation Group, notes that ETS dolphins have pigmentation that differs consistently from that of the subpopulations along the coast of mainland China and the Pearl River Estuary. The ETS dolphins’ preferred habitat is subtropical estuaries where saltwater and freshwater mix, such as where the Dajia River, Dadu River, Zhuoshui River and Zengwen River empty into the sea along the west coast of central Taiwan, points out Tsai Chia-yang, director of the Taiwan Environmental Protection Union Changhua Division. “That’s why the subpopulation doesn’t live in the waters off Kenting in Pingtung County or off Hualien and Taitung counties—there aren’t any major rivers there,” he says.
No sooner had the discovery of the white dolphin subpopulation been announced in 2002, than Taiwan’s environmental groups started raising concerns about its prospects for survival, as well as the need for conservation. The number of individual white dolphins is currently believed to be no more than 100. That figure is thought to represent a decline from the past, as many Changhua County fishermen reported seeing them more frequently around 30 years ago, Tsai Chia-yang says. In 2008, the IUCN listed the ETS subpopulation as “critically endangered” on its Red List of Threatened Species because of its geographical isolation and small—and probably falling—population size.
Mudflat crabs and many other intertidal zone species inhabit the wetland at Fangyuan Township, Changhua County. The wetland is a major source of food for white dolphins. (Photo Courtesy of Taiwan Environmental Protection Union Changhua Division)
Since 2002, newer surveys have documented the presence of the ETS dolphins to the north in the waters off Tongxiao Township in Miaoli County and stretching about 195 kilometers south to Jiangjun Harbor in Tainan County. As a result, the area from Tongxiao to Jiangjun Harbor has been identified as a “priority” ETS subpopulation habitat by the Eastern Taiwan Strait Sousa Technical Advisory Working Group (ETSSTAWG) in its latest paper, Averting the baiji syndrome: conserving habitat for critically endangered dolphins in Eastern Taiwan Strait. The paper was published in the international journal Aquatic Conservation Marine and Freshwater Ecosystems in 2010.
There are two “hot spots” within that distribution range, according to studies conducted in 2010 by Chou Lien-siang, a professor in the Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at National Taiwan University (NTU). The first ETS concentration can be found in an area of the Taiwan Strait that extends from southern Miaoli County to northern Changhua County, while the other is near the Waisanding Sand Bar, which is located in the strait near the border of Chiayi and Yunlin counties in southern Taiwan.
Both Tsai and Peter S. Ross, ETSSTAWG chairperson, believe that industrial development along the shallow coastal waters off Taiwan’s west coast, as well as destruction of coastal wetland areas, represent the most direct threats to the future of these small dolphins. Tsai believes that the reclamation of large areas of land likely has reduced the local white dolphin population, pointing to the examples of Formosa Petrochemical Corp.’s No. 6 Naphtha Cracker Plant at Mailiao Township in Yunlin County, which occupies 2,255 hectares of land reclaimed from the sea, as well as the Changhua Coastal Industrial Park, which covers 2,587 hectares of reclaimed land.
The current dispute centers on a proposal by Kuokuang Petrochemical Technology Co., a consortium led by state-run oil refiner CPC Corp., Taiwan, to reclaim some 4,200 hectares just north of the mouth of the Zhuoshui River in Changhua County for the construction of a petrochemical refinery complex. “Removal of such shallow waters or intertidal waters reduces the size of their habitat,” Ross says of the dolphins.
The area Kuokuang proposes to build on would include much of the coastal wetland that stretches between the townships of Fangyuan and Dacheng. That wetland is an important source of fish, a major staple of the Sousa chinensis diet. “The removal of wetlands can destroy fish habitats and thereby reduce food availability for Sousa,” Ross says.
The proposed construction site would also sit between the two ETS dolphin hot spots identified by Chou Lien-siang in her 2010 study. The company notes that although the planned location of the complex is well outside the two hot spots, the dolphins do pass through the area in question during their seasonal migrations. Kuokuang believes the effect on them would be minimal, however, saying they would quickly learn to take a route that avoids the complex.
NTU professor Chou Lien-siang believes, however, that cutting the dolphins’ corridor could halve their population within 15 years, which would be devastating to an already endangered subspecies. In its Averting the baiji syndrome paper, ETSSTAWG wrote that “for such a small, isolated and threatened population, priority habitat should not be limited to areas of particularly intensive dolphin use or high dolphin density.” ETSSTAWG states that the protected habitat should include the entire area where the dolphins have been observed, as well as nearby coastal areas with similar biophysical features.
A group of parents and children participate in an environmental tour at the Fangyuan wetland in October 2010. The wetland area has been targeted for reclamation by the Kuokuang Petrochemical Technology Co. (Photo Courtesy of Taiwan Environmental Protection Union Changhua Division)
To provide greater legal protection for the species, Chen Chang-po, a researcher who recently retired from the Biodiversity Research Center at Academia Sinica, believes that the Forestry Bureau under the Council of Agriculture should designate the ETS subpopulation’s priority habitat—the two hot spots and the waters in between them—as “major wildlife habitat” under the Wildlife Conservation Act. According to the act, the original ecological functions of such habitats should be maintained, while construction and land use should be carried out in the manner that least affects the habitat.
Providing greater legal protection for the dolphin’s habitat would also benefit the environment—and commercial activities that depend on it—in other ways. Ross says that protecting the dolphins and their habitat would help to protect and improve the health and productivity of coastal fisheries. “Many examples exist where marine protected areas actually lead to increased fisheries production because fish spawning habitats have been protected,” he says.
Local environmental groups, meanwhile, are moving ahead with their own conservation efforts. Tsai Chia-yang of the Taiwan Environmental Protection Union Changhua Division says he became enamored of the dolphins when he saw a school of more than 10 of them swimming in an estuary near Fangyuan two years ago. To conserve their habitat, in April 2010 Tsai initiated a project to raise money for an environmental fund that hopes to purchase the site that Kuokuang wants to build refineries on. The Republic of China government now holds the title to that area and is awaiting the results of an environmental impact survey before determining how it will be used.
Sold by the Square Meter
Under Tsai’s plan, individuals pledged to buy shares based on the cost of one square meter of land, or NT$119 (US$3.84). The price is higher than the NT$100 (US$3.23) per square meter offered by Kuokuang.
The first phase of Tsai’s plan was completed in June 2010, by which time 50,000 people had signed up to buy 200 hectares of coastal wetlands at Kuokuang’s proposed location. The second phase of the campaign was launched in September 2010 and is aimed at the eventual purchase of another 800 hectares that makes up the adjoining intertidal zone. Tsai explains that the original 200 hectares form a coastal strip along which the critically endangered white dolphins live. The 800 hectares in the second phase of the campaign are an essential habitat for fish the dolphins prey on, as well as for bird species such as the black-faced spoonbill and Eurasian curlew, he says.
More than 6,000 people had registered to purchase shares in the second-phase conservation project as of the beginning of November 2010, Tsai says. “We hope we can get a total of more than 200,000 participants by enlisting other environmental groups, academics and religious groups,” he says. “Accumulating that number of supporters is a way to tell the government how many people are willing to protect the wetland.”
Nearly 10,000 demonstrators participate in a march protesting Kuokuang Petrochemical’s proposed complex in November 2010. (Photo Courtesy of Chiu Hui-ling)
Of Shellfish and Men
The brackish wetland areas of coastal Changhua and Yunlin counties not only produce food for threatened Chinese white dolphins, but are also home to countless oysters and other shellfish, both wild and cultivated, as well as border a sizeable human population. Like the dolphins, the oysters are threatened by the habitat loss arising from wetland development, while humans and all shellfish in the area must cope with the emissions of the petrochemical industry.
Changhua farmer Hong Xin-you says that since the No. 6 Naphtha Cracker Plant began operating in 1999, “there has been a black substance floating on the surface of the water of aquaculture ponds in our neighborhood every morning.” He says the effects of the pollution are not immediately apparent, but can cause long-term damage. Before the naphtha plant began operating, clams cultivated in Taixi Township in Yunlin County reached maturity in only 10 months, Hong says, but he has observed that now it takes one to two years for them to mature sufficiently to be harvested.
Oysters also constitute an important part of the local economy. Along streets in Fangyuan, empty oyster shells pile up to form small hills. Middle-aged women sit around tables opening oysters, while men can be seen sitting nearby, hammering at cultivated oysters that have been grown on strings to separate them. Taixi Township, meanwhile, accounts for two-thirds of Taiwan’s oyster larvae production, according to Lin Jin-lang, chairperson of the Yunlin County Shallow Waters Aquaculture Association. “There are nearly 80,000 Yunlin residents involved in the aquaculture industry,” he says.
Concerns over the impact of wetland development on shellfish and the local economy came to a head on a rainy day in Taipei in November 2010, when nearly 10,000 demonstrators participated in a march protesting Kuokuang’s proposed petrochemical complex, with around half of them hailing from Changhua and Yunlin counties. One 70-year-old woman marched while wearing strings of oyster shells. The woman, who did not wish to be named in the media, said that she and almost all the other residents of the five villages in Fangyuan Township had traveled to Taipei to join the protest. She had cultivated oysters for more than 60 years, she said, and had also worked with other members of her family in the fishing industry. The oyster harvest in 2010 had been worse than that in 2009, she said. “Since the naphtha cracker plant was built at Mailiao, the oyster harvest has been worsening year after year. It’s also become more difficult to catch fish,” she said. “If the Kuokuang plant gets built, how will we be able to survive?”
Fangyuan residents open oysters. Locals say oyster harvests have fallen each year since a naphtha cracker plant was built nearby. (Photo Courtesy of Chiu Hui-ling)
While environmentalists and many of those in the shellfish industry oppose the Kuokuang plant, it is important to note that it does have some local support. Four villages in Fangyuan Township conducted a referendum on the establishment of the Kuokuang complex in March 2010, with 389 of the 580 votes cast in favor of the construction of the plant. While the result can be read as an approval rate of 67 percent, the area has around 2,800 eligible voters, meaning that turnout was a mere 21 percent. Those in favor of the project were very likely driven by hopes that it would lift the local economy.
Shellfish are not the only fauna that could be threatened by industrial pollution in the Fangyuan area, of course, as health experts believe it may also pose a risk to human health. One concern is the fine particles less than 2.5 micrometers in size that are emitted by the No. 6 Naphtha Cracker Plant. Studies suggest that long-term exposure to such fine particulate matter may be associated with increased rates of chronic bronchitis, reduced lung function and increased mortality from lung cancer and heart disease, points out Chen Chien-jen, an epidemiologist, former minister of the Department of Health (DOH) and current distinguished research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Genomics Research Center.
Tsuang Ben-jei, a professor in the Department of Environmental Engineering at National Chung Hsing University in Taichung, central Taiwan, conducted a study between 2006 and 2010 that showed that Yunlin County residents living near the plant face an increased risk of contracting those diseases. The danger could also be more widespread, as Tsuang believes the fine particles may not only fall to earth in Yunlin, but also be carried long distances by the wind to Chiayi, Tainan and Kaohsiung counties to the south.
For local residents like farmer Hong Xin-you, tourism represents a better economic development option for the area than the construction of more petrochemical refineries. Hong notes that Fangyuan is the only place in Taiwan where people still collect and transport oysters with carts drawn by bullocks. “Around 20 of the bullock carts are still on duty. They’re mostly driven by people over 60, while the 30-somethings all use motorized tricycles [to collect oysters],” he says.
Collecting oysters with bullock carts is a picturesque part of local culture in the Fangyuan area. (Photo Courtesy of Taiwan Environmental Protection Union Changhua Division)
With the picturesque bullock carts, white dolphins and other fauna living in the largest intertidal zone in western Taiwan, Hong and Tsai Chia-yang of the Taiwan Environmental Protection Union believe that the area possesses enough unique resources to develop a successful tourism industry. “Fangyuan is not a deserted or useless area, like some people imagine. We need to think about how to capitalize on existing local resources to boost the economy,” Tsai says.
Tsai and Hong also believe that promoting the area’s unique characteristics could lead to their preservation. Collecting oysters with bullock carts could disappear within decades, Hong says, but “if it’s used as a way to promote local tourism, our next generation can still appreciate the tradition.” Tsai says that an economy based on cultivating oysters and tourism featuring local fauna like the white dolphins could be sustained indefinitely. “But can you say that about the petrochemical industry?” he asks.
Former DOH minister Chen Chien-jen has become very involved in the effort to protect the wetlands near Fangyuan and Dacheng from development by the petrochemical industry, going as far as giving a short speech at the protest march on November 13. “I was very touched when I set foot on the wetland at Fangyuan for the first time,” he exclaimed in the speech. “Such a beautiful place is what God has bestowed upon Taiwanese people. But factory chimneys could appear in this place in a few years and belch black smoke into the sky. Are you willing to see that happen?”
For Tsai Chia-yang, the central question about Kuokuang’s plan to develop the wetland area concerns the “ownership” of the environment. “The environment is used by and belongs to all of the people,” Tsai says. “It shouldn’t be monopolized by or destroyed by any consortium.”
—Vicky Huang
Write to Vicky Huang at powery18@mail.gio.gov.tw