Temples in Taiwan to go green and limit joss stick use

TAIPEI: The bearded deity Guan Yu presides over worshippers who kneel before his altar at the Xingtian Temple. But devotees at Taipei’s Zhongshan district do not pay respects to the Taoist God of War in the traditional way, by lighting joss sticks or burning paper offerings.

The temple has banned the burning of paper offerings to reduce air pollution in and around the building since it was built in 1967.

Other temples are also going green. Among them is one of Taiwan’s oldest and most popular temples, Longshan Temple.

It recently limited each devotee to one joss stick and reduced the number of joss-stick holders from seven to one.

The ground-up efforts are accompanied by the government’s push to reduce the burning of joss sticks and paper offerings to improve Taiwan’s air quality.

With as many as 30,000 temples islandwide, Taiwan has the highest density of temples in the world, where a temple can literally be found in every junction in Taipei.

“The consequences will have a detrimental effect,” said Tsai Hungteh, director-general of Taiwan’s Environment Prot ec t i o n Administration’s air quality protection and noise control department.

During a nine-day Taoist pilgrimage in central Taiwan last year, government monitors found levels of PM2.5 that reached more than 60 times the World Health Organisation’s recommended levels.

This year alone, residents living near temples lodged about 3,000 complaints about smoke and ash, surpassing the 2,600 in 2015.

Hsu Wen-bao, chairman of Taiwan’s General Association of Chinese Taoism, has been in talks with temples to allay their fears of being marginalised and to spread the word on eco-friendly practices.

“We also care about the environment and don’t want to harm others through our practices,” he said — The Straits Times/Asia News Network