Food is life – and as long as it is, Pingtung County will be important to the people of Taiwan. Agriculture, aquaculture and fishing dominate its economy today, with specialties in roses, mangos, lemons, coffee, cocoa and, a Taiwanese delicacy, lotus mist. Eight national and county parks, hot springs, Hakka and aboriginal villages and some of Taiwan’s most beautiful landscape make it a tourist destination as well. Its 800,000 people live in 33 townships scattered across 2,700 square kilometers.

Pingtung faces the challenges of all rural counties around the world: distance, an aging population, the out-migration of youth seeking opportunity and the need to diversify an economy dependent on the low-margin raising of food. Unlike so many such places, however, it is attacking the challenges creatively and persistently to generate prosperity while preserving its treasured ways of life.

Connectivity for Economy and Life

The county partners with national government and the private sector to create and expand the digital networks that support tourism, agriculture and quality of life. Taiwan’s Ministry of Digital Affairs (MODA) has constructed a gigabit backbone network to connect and upgrade fixed and wireless local networks throughout the county. Special focus goes to 8 townships of indigenous peoples located in the mountains, for which the network provides free outdoor wireless broadband. The ambitious project has succeeded in bringing gigabit broadband service to 95% of the county.

Another partnership has focused on providing dedicated connectivity for local industry. Private 5G wireless is becoming a standard for factory automation, and MODA has introduced 5G networks and applications to support meat processing, remote inspection and monitoring of refrigeration for food safety to meet international standards. With 13,000 base stations in facilities across the county, the network is supporting 97 dedicated applications in transportation, manufacturing, food and healthcare.

Creating Opportunities for Youth

Pingtung also invests in retaining its youth while equipping them with STEM and technology skills to inject new digital talent into the economy. The county’s three universities provide higher education and teacher and vocational education. They are already graduating 800 students per year in STEM-related fields. Students and graduates can join the Pingtung Digital Youth Center, which serves as a bridge from school to work and entrepreneurship. The Youth Center offers professional enhancement courses that prepare students for work in local companies, and teams have launched new firms including a producer of light sculptures and a drone services company that remotely patrols and monitors farmland.

Faced with labor shortages in farming, the Pingtung AI Agri Hub has introduced a drone training system to promote development of a drone industry. Offering license training, operational skills training and job counseling, the Hub has attracted more than 20 startup teams focusing on drone spraying, agricultural product sales, agricultural tourism and coffee care.

Smarter Agriculture, Aging, Travel and Business

The county collaborates with national government on projects aiming to accelerate innovation in public and private spheres. The Pingtung Agricultural Biotechnology Park has attracted more than 100 tenant companies bringing combined investment of US$473 million into the county. One has developed a dynamic Aquaculture Calendar application that significantly boosts the productivity of fish farming while improving visibility into operations. Another has created Aquadlink, a system for remote monitoring of key environmental conditions from temperature and dissolved oxygen to salinity and pH. These technologies have already led to a 20% increase in output and 30% reduction in electricity use in the county’s fish farms and are being exported to other southeast Asian countries.

A public-private partnership has produced digital tools that help farmers integrate the international GRI 13 Agricultural Sustainability Guidelines into their operations. The platform provides pest and disease predictions and alerts, recommends pest control application and forecasts climate impacts on crop growth. Compliance with the low-carbon Guidelines is expected to increase the brand value and selling price of Pingtung crops.

With tourism being a major industry, Pingtung worked with national government and private companies to deploy a mix of smart parking meters, license-plate readers and real time bus information via app to reduce traffic congestion in the most popular tourist destinations. The systems have reduced parking search time by 20%.

Inclusion and Engagement

To entice small-to-midsize (SME) businesses to adopt digital technology, the county adopted a MODA program called TCloud. After passing an online review of their digital readiness, SMEs receive digital points that provide a 50% discount on hardware and software. Over 550 SMEs have adopted mobile payment, e-commerce, point-of-sale, inventory management and online reservation systems that meet the growing demand for digital service.

Digital training for seniors has served nearly 200,000 elders, while investment in hardware and software in schools and Digital Opportunity Centers is delivering IT training on computers and mobile devices, with strong participation from women. The county also recruits college students to serve in remote elementary and middle schools, where they tutor disadvantaged students through video conferencing and online learning platforms.

As an island nation subject to typhoons and earthquakes, Taiwan focuses national and local efforts on sustainability and resilience. The county operates its own Renewable Energy Office, which has deployed Taiwan’s first floating solar panels and marine power projects. Green building regulations encourage also building owners to install solar panels. By August 2022, Pingtung became the first Taiwanese county to integrate 1 GW of renewable energy into the grid. Through these multi-faceted efforts, Pingtung County is raising the productivity of its industries and preparing its people to prosper in a digital future.

Population: 798,940

Website: www.pthg.gov.tw

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