《TAIPEI TIMES》 Flora calendar free to all

PROMOTION: The Forestry Bureau calendar highlights the versatility of forest plants and can serve as a starting point for Taiwanese to get closer to herbs and forests

By Wu Hsin-tien / Staff reporter

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Due to popular public demand, the Forestry Bureau announced that its “Forest of Food” calendar can be downloaded for free from the Internet until the end of March.

The calendar was the brainchild of Forestry Bureau Director-General Lin Hua-ching （林華慶）, who said he wanted to draw attention to the versatility of forest plants.

“People who use calendars typically place them in the most visible spots, which makes calendars the best tool for promoting policies,” Lin said.

“However, they can only be eye-catching if their layout is innovative,” he added.

“I came into contact with Amis culture a few years ago and found it amazing how they use a variety of plants, flowers, seeds and fungi in their daily lives,” he said, adding that using plants in forests is one of the most overlooked ideas in the forestry industry.

For example, herbs have many uses, but it is a pity that only Aborigines or people living nearby know how to use them, Lin said.

Most Taiwanese are unfamiliar with forests, said Kan Ko-ping （淦克萍）, director of Seedesign, the company that designed the calendar.

The images of herbs in the calendar are a starting point for people to get closer to forests, a strategy that should prove effective given the popularity of the calendar, Kan said.

Designing the calendar was quite difficult, as many of their ideas were rejected by the bureau, which demanded that each image be a faithful reproduction of plants, she said.

A number of people from Hong Kong who attended a speech she gave at a coffee shop in the city told her that they came to know about the company through the calendars, Kan said.

While the calendar was to be launched in October last year, it was delayed because of a paper shortage, she said.

The company finally received the calendars from the printing press at the end of last month.

Despite numerous public requests to purchase the calendar, the bureau decided to make it available online for people to download it, because selling calendars in the first month of a new year is weird, Kan said.

The calendar can be downloaded at drive.google.com/drive/folders/1vNwOou6yhl2_jJkhBK-FSZyjjgbWzwxX

新聞來源：TAIPEI TIMES