【發行人的話】 Publisher’s Note

今年的秋分，恰好也是馬太鞍溪事故滿一週年的日子。這一期文摘，我們從土地與人的關係出發：從食味值科學連結小農與消費者的「身土不二」，到馬太鞍溪畔種碳小農在氣候災難後的韌性；從田祖永續農業洪健哲博士猝逝後，田祖轉移至高醫大產學發展中心、設立健哲有限公司延續遺志，到日本能登半島千枚田在地震重建路上，選擇以覆蓋作物迎接土壤新生。四則消息，都是同一件事的不同切面：土壤有機碳不只是數字，更是人與土地共同承擔、共同復原的證據。

方儉

This year's autumn equinox also coincides with the first anniversary of the Matai'an Creek accident. In this issue of the digest, we start from the relationship between land and people: from the scientific connection between small farmers and consumers in terms of taste value, to the resilience of smallholder farmers who grow carbon on the banks of Matai'an Creek after climate disasters; From the sudden death of Dr. Hong Jianzhe of Sustainable Agriculture, Tian Zu moved to the Industry-Academia Development Center of National University of Medical Sciences and established Jianzhe Co., Ltd. to continue his legacy, to the Senmaida on the Noto Peninsula in Japan, where he chose cover crops to welcome soil rebirth. The four pieces of news are all different aspects of the same thing: soil organic carbon is not only a number, but also evidence of the shared responsibility and restoration of people and land.

Sincerely,

Person in charge：Jay Fang 

CEO，Eco-Affinity Inc.

秋分，是秋天的第四個節氣，今年落在9月23日。這天太陽直射赤道，晝夜幾乎等長，過了秋分，白晝漸短、夜晚漸長，早晚溫差常達10度以上。養生核心是「平衡」二字：飲食忌偏燥偏涼，南瓜、栗子、蓮藕等溫潤食材最合時宜，生冷冰品要節制；作息宜早睡早起，順應日照調整節奏，也要留意「悲秋」情緒，適度曬太陽穩定心神。田間則是秋收秋種同步進行，二期稻收割尾聲、雜糧開始播種，柚子也正值採收旺季。

Autumn Equinox, the fourth autumn solar term, falls on September 23 this year. The sun sits directly over the equator, making day and night nearly equal in length; afterward, days shorten and nights lengthen, with temperature swings often exceeding 10°C. The core theme is balance: avoid overly drying or overly cold foods, favor mild, moistening ingredients like pumpkin, chestnut, and lotus root, and cut back on cold or icy items. Keep an early sleep-wake routine in step with shorter daylight, and get some sun to steady the mood against seasonal "autumn melancholy." In the fields, harvest and planting overlap — second-crop rice wraps up while grain crops go into the ground, and pomelo season is in full swing.

On September 8, at a community event in Wan-an, Chishang, we met with farmers enrolled in our carbon farming program to discuss rice palatability (Miwaku) scores. We explained the science and sensory principles behind the metric and demonstrated a hydrogen-peroxide test in the field, helping farmers see concretely how palatability connects to soil organic carbon and strengthening their commitment to the program. Under the ESG Green Shinkansen sandbox initiative, we use the palatability score as a pricing benchmark, gradually shifting farmers away from a mindset that has long prized yield alone while neglecting value and worth. On September 18, we ran a parallel training for consumers with the volunteer team of Aerospace Industrial Development Corporation (AIDC). More than forty enthusiastic volunteers blind-tasted three rice samples scoring 60, 70, and 79. None had ever heard of a palatability score before, yet relying purely on their own sense of taste, they clearly distinguished high, medium, and low scores. The Dean of Feng Chia University's College of Social Innovation, also an assistant professor of cooperative economics and social enterprise management, joined and advised the session. He stressed that international ESG evaluation increasingly demands authenticity, and that "anti-greenwashing" will become the mainstream standard; as an ESG evaluator for multiple companies himself, he holds firms accountable for genuine contributions to environment, society, governance, and sustainability. Farn Jenq affirmed that under the Gold Standard-certified smallholder carbon farming program, Tian Di He Qi provides a full evidentiary chain covering logistics, information, and financial flows, meeting two baseline requirements of international ESG/SDG certification: first, that products genuinely originate from farmers in need, and second, that farmers receive more than seventy percent of the value of corporate ESG investment or procurement, all in compliance with IFRS sustainability and climate-related financial disclosure standards.

2025年9月23日，馬太鞍溪發生重大事故；今年秋分恰逢一週年，是令人遺憾卻也值得提醒我們的日子——氣候災難下，小農往往最先受害。馬太鞍溪畔的種碳小農，南岸大巴塱林清福，北岸萬榮鄉謝清波、盧玲玲夫婦，都曾遭受損失，所幸人員平安。方儉陪同風傳媒記者張瀞文、攝影記者劉偉宏走訪馬太鞍各界，了解小農處境；在氣候變遷考驗下，這些種碳小農展現的韌性格外鮮明。他寫道：台灣是地殼擠壓隆起的新生島嶼，僅三百萬年歷史，地震、颱風、暴雨、土石流形塑了東西岸迥異地貌。2009年88風災後，他曾在小林村與倖存災民相處半年，多為農民，自此關注農民處境。他指出，不論是否有全球暖化，此類災難仍會一再上演，而每次悲劇下，最無助、最沒有聲音的，往往是沒有耕地、最少被照顧到的農民。這也是他已過退休之齡仍持續工作的價值所在。風傳媒團隊重返花蓮光復，以七篇系列報導呈現災後一年真實樣貌：橋樑重建、學校復課、街道恢復，但巨大土堆仍留在縱谷，風砂、安置、農地復耕與公共工程持續影響當地生活。災難有發生日期，重建卻無明確終點，歡迎讀者參考、引用並註明出處，本會亦可提供空拍照片與影片。

September 23, 2025 marked a major disaster on the Mataian River; this year's autumn equinox, also September 23, falls exactly one year later — a regrettable date, and a reminder that in climate disasters, smallholder farmers are so often the first to suffer. Carbon-farming smallholders along the Mataian, including Lin Ching-fu on the south bank in Dabalong and the couple Hsieh Ching-po and Lu Ling-ling on the north bank in Wanrong, all sustained losses, though thankfully everyone is safe. Farn Jenq, head of Tian Di He Qi, accompanied Storm Media reporter Chang Ching-wen and photojournalist Liu Wei-hung on a visit to communities near Mataian, gaining firsthand understanding of the farmers' situation; against the trials of climate-driven disaster, the resilience of these carbon-farming smallholders stood out clearly. Reflecting afterward, Farn wrote that Taiwan, a young island uplifted by tectonic collision only three million years old, has been shaped by earthquakes, typhoons, storms, and landslides into starkly different eastern and western landscapes. After the 2009 Typhoon Morakot disaster, he lived alongside survivors in Xiaolin Village for six months, most of them farmers — an experience that first drew his attention to farmers' circumstances. Whether or not global warming is a factor, he notes, such disasters will keep recurring, and in every tragedy it is farmers without land title who are the most helpless and least cared for — why he keeps working past retirement age. Storm Media recently returned to Guangfu, Hualien, producing a seven-part series marking one year since the disaster: bridges rebuilt, schools reopened, streets restored — yet massive silt remains in the valley, and wind-blown sand, resettlement, farmland recovery, and public works continue to shape daily life. A disaster has a date; reconstruction has no clear end point. Topics covered include the temporary bridge and sand problem, transitional housing, school and trauma recovery, disputes over 200-plus hectares of land expropriation, the struggle to recover 770 hectares of farmland, lingering upstream risk, and a year of smallholder self-help — available for reference and citation with attribution; we can also provide aerial photos and video.

協助我們進行土壤有機碳檢測的田祖永續農業公司洪健哲博士，去年9月底曾參與馬太鞍溪救災行動，腳部受傷轉為蜂窩性組織炎，住院檢查時又意外發現罹患白血病，治療八個月後，不幸於今年5月25日辭世，得年44歲，痛失英才。因洪博士驟逝，田祖永續農業公司將檢測設備儀器轉移至高雄醫學大學產學發展中心，並在此設立「健哲有限公司」，以紀念洪博士並延續他未竟的志業。健哲公司以ISO 17025:2017為標竿，作為第三方實驗室，接受天地和氣委託進行土壤有機碳檢測，目前僅提供此項服務，未來將拓展至更廣泛的農業與健康生命科學檢測研究。健哲公司的成立，確保了洪博士生前建立的檢測品質與公正性得以延續——獨立於天地和氣之外的第三方角色，是黃金標準認證體系中土壤有機碳數據可信度的重要一環。我們期待與健哲公司一同紀念洪博士，將他對土壤科學的堅持，化為種碳計畫持續向前的基礎。

Dr. Hung Chien-che of Tianzu Sustainable Agriculture, who conducted our soil organic carbon testing, took part in Mataian River disaster relief efforts in late September last year. A foot injury developed into cellulitis, and hospital examinations then unexpectedly revealed leukemia; after eight months of treatment, he passed away on May 25 this year at the age of 44 — a devastating loss of talent taken far too soon. Following his death, Tianzu Sustainable Agriculture relocated its testing equipment and instruments to Kaohsiung Medical University's Office of Industry-Academia Cooperation, establishing Chien-Che Co., Ltd. there in his memory and to carry forward his unfinished work. Benchmarked against ISO 17025:2017, Chien-Che operates as an independent third-party laboratory conducting soil organic carbon testing commissioned by Tian Di He Qi. It currently offers only soil organic carbon testing, with plans to expand into broader agricultural and health-related life science testing and research in the years ahead. For the carbon farming program, the founding of Chien-Che matters a great deal: it ensures continuity of the testing quality and impartiality Dr. Hung established, and an independent, third-party laboratory role is a critical link in the credibility of soil organic carbon data within the Gold Standard certification framework, giving both farmers and corporate ESG partners confidence in the underlying measurements. Going forward, Chien-Che will continue to carry out commissioned testing with fairness and professionalism. We hope to honor Dr. Hung's memory together with his former colleagues, turning his lifelong dedication to soil science into a lasting foundation on which the carbon farming program can keep moving forward, so that the rigor he insisted on outlives him in every measurement the program relies on.

2024年1月1日，日本能登半島發生近8級大地震，災情慘重。慈濟基金會於1月13日即進入能登，在零下氣溫中供應熱食，並向高齡弱勢者發放「見舞金（撫慰金）」。慈濟希望藉黃金標準永續認證，為能登小農提供國際公正的重建振興指標，衡量災後中長程計畫成效，這也是慈濟少數在賑災後再啟動中長期計畫的案例。能登里山小農種碳專案自2025年起為期一年。千枚田是日本重要的農業與自然遺產，是里山永續農業人與自然和諧共存的代表，由當地「愛耕會」耕作，這群平均年齡超過70歲的小農，面臨九成農田震損、無法蓄水耕作的困境。一年半來，他們恢復了25%的田地。2025年加入種碳專案後，愛耕會決定停用除草劑，改用有機複合肥，並延續「刈草十字軍」傳統，號召1004位志工（對應1004片田）協力除草。8月17日至28日，方儉與慈濟執行長顧問謝景貴前往能登見證，並商討覆蓋作物方案。愛耕會於9月10日播撒覆蓋作物種子，因9月12日即需收割。收割當天，兩天前播下的大麥種子已開始發芽——種子與土壤的生命力，正是固碳延續的基礎，令人振奮。

On January 1, 2024, a magnitude-nearly-8 earthquake struck Japan's Noto Peninsula, causing severe damage. The Tzu Chi Foundation arrived on the peninsula as early as January 13, serving hot meals in sub-zero temperatures and distributing condolence payments to elderly and unsupported vulnerable residents. Tzu Chi hopes that Gold Standard sustainability certification can give Noto's smallholder farmers an internationally impartial set of indicators to measure the success of medium- to long-term post-disaster reconstruction plans — one of the few cases in which the foundation has launched a medium- to long-term program following emergency relief. The Noto Satoyama smallholder carbon farming project runs for one year starting in 2025. The Senmaida terraced rice fields are an important Japanese agricultural and natural heritage site, and a representative example of satoyama sustainable agriculture, where people and nature coexist in harmony. Cultivation is now carried out by local farmers organized as the Aikokai (Loving Cultivation Association); these smallholders, averaging over 70 years old, face a situation in which ninety percent of the terraces were cracked by the earthquake and can no longer hold water for cultivation. Over the past year and a half, they have restored 25 percent of the fields. After joining the carbon farming project in 2025, the Aikokai decided to stop using herbicides and switch to organic compound fertilizer, discontinuing synthetic chemical fertilizers altogether, while continuing the tradition of the "Weeding Crusade," calling on 1,004 volunteers — matching 1,004 plots — to help with weeding. From August 17 to 28, Farn Jenq and Tzu Chi executive advisor Hsieh Ching-kuei traveled to Noto to witness this effort and discuss cover cropping. The Aikokai sowed cover crop seed on September 10, since harvest was scheduled for September 12. On harvest day, we found the barley seeds sown just two days earlier had already begun to sprout — the vitality of seed and soil is the very foundation on which carbon sequestration continues, a genuinely exciting sight.

Issue 8 will be published on October 8 (Cold Dew), with the tentative theme of corporate ESG Green Shinkansen applications. Readers are welcome to share field observations, corporate partnership updates, or related news to enrich the next issue.