Page 63 - Hualien Sustainable Living Bilingual Magazine

Dongi mentioned changes in traditional food culture, including the ban on brewing alcohol and foraging from the mountains. Hualien Issue “Many of these customs are essential to our lives, like the culture of foraging, which is actually a natural pruning process that helps plants grow better.”She is grateful that Taiwan’s government has made several substantial amendments to the Forestry Act since 2015. The most up-to- date articles announced on May 5, 2021 give indigenous peoples the right to forage on their traditional lands and gradually relaxed the restrictions on the indigenous brewing culture. This is a great encouragement to the preservation of Taiwan’s cultural assets and the maintenance of the indigenous people’s traditional way of living. “Indigenous peoples make up 5% of the world’s population and 22% of the land, and overall, 80% of biodiverse environments are created by indigenous peoples.”Dongi proudly shared that at the Slow Food Congress 2022, she encouraged indigenous communities around the world to take ownership of food, to voice their opinions, and to be included in national systems.“I am an indigenous person from Taiwan. Each group on this island has a different language, culture, and culinary identity, and our country has made indigenous languages official languages.” In recent years, the Wild Vegetable School has also received support from the Hualien County Government and the Forestry Bureau, and it has become a key participant in seed conservation efforts. Dongi has compiled her experiences in collecting wild vegetables over the years to promote food and farming education, and has collaborated with the Slow Food headquarters in Italy several times. She also enthusiastically participates in the seed conservation program. In 2021, Dongi sent 12 species of native seeds to the World Vegetable Center in Tainan for off- site backup. On May 26, 2022, she sent three species to the Svalbard Global Seed Vault in Norway. She hopes that one day the people of Taiwan will learn to attach greater importance to native species, so that wild vegetables will become a culinary delight on the table enjoyed by everyone, and become a precious tribal food memory and an integral part of life that more people can share, thus transforming Taiwan into an international slow food model for the global community. 58