EZ News 03/04/24

Good afternoon, I'm _____ with today's episode of EZ News. Tai-Ex opening The Tai-Ex opened up 16-points this morning from Friday's close, at 18,952 on turnover of 4.6-billion N-T. The market closed marginally lower on Friday, despite Wall Street climbing to all-time high overnight. New Taipei to Fine Tainted Chinese Chili Powder Importer The New Taipei City Department of Health says it will fine the company responsible for importing chili powder from China found to contain a carcinogenic dye 2-million N- T for violating the Act Governing Food Safety and Sanitation. According to city officials, Bao Hsin Enterprises imported chili powder containing Sudan III from China and supplied it to downstream (下游) food companies islandwide. Officials say Bao Hsin was informed that its imported chili powder was substandard by some of those companies, but failed to take any action to initiate a product recall, which could have prevented the tainted powder from being used in food products. The New Taipei District Prosecutors' Office took Bao Hsin head, Liu Ching-shih into custody this past weekend. Tourism Development Fund to End Debt Financing if Target are Met The Tourism Administration says the government's tourism promotion fund is expected to end debt financing one year ahead of schedule, if the tourist arrival target of 12-million visitors for this year is met. The Tourism Development Fund generated (產生的) 5.866-billion N-T in revenue last year excluding the special government budget, which was about 70-per cent of the pre-coronavirus pandemic average revenue of 6.1-billion N-T. The fund's current book debt is 400 million N-T. Data shows that more than 6.48-million tourists visited Taiwan last year. Hong Kong, Macau, Japan and South Korea were the largest sources of visitors. US VP and Israeli to Discuss Gaza Ceasefire The Vice President of the United States is due to meet with a member of Israel's war cabinet in Washington later today to discuss how to get humanitarian aid into Gaza. Kamala Harris and Benny Gantz are also expected to talk about the need for a temporary (暫時的) ceasefire. According to Gantz's office he will also meet US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken. Our US correspondent Jagruti Dave has more. Malaysia Gov Considers New Proposal for MH370 Search Malaysia’s government says it may renew the search for MH370 after a U.S. technology firm proposed a fresh search in the southern Indian Ocean where the Malaysia Airlines plane is believed to have crashed. The plane with 239 people aboard vanished a decade ago while en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. Malaysia's transport minister says that Texas-based Ocean Infinity proposed (提議) another “no find, no fee” search, expanding from the site where it first looked in 2018. He said he has invited the company to meet him to evaluate new evidence it has to find the plane’s final resting place. That was the I.C.R.T. news, Check in again tomorrow for our simplified version of the news, uploaded every day in the afternoon. Enjoy the rest of your day, I'm _____. -- Hosting provided by SoundOn