State of the World's Minorities and Indigenous Peoples 2009 - Taiwan

Taiwan has a fairly progressive record on indigenous rights. Thirteen Aboriginal tribes have been officially recognized, each having its own language and customs. The indigenous population, numbering 484,000 people and representing about 2.1 per cent of Taiwan's total population, lives mostly in eastern Taiwan and mountainous areas, and often faces more economic difficulties than majority Taiwanese. Taiwan reserves six of its 113 legislative seats for Aborigines and maintains a cabinet-level Council of Indigenous Peoples, which works in conjunction with other ministries to raise living standards in Aboriginal regions through basic infrastructure projects. The council also provides emergency funds and college scholarships to the indigenous population.

Indigenous groups were increasingly visible in 2008, attempting to pressure central government to formally recognize their customary land rights. Groups claim that although the Indigenous Peoples Basic Law of 2005 has been approved, indigenous people's rights are still disregarded, especially when their culture is in conflict with national laws. For instance, on 31 December 2007 several Puyuma hunters participating in the Grand Hunters' Festival – an event that the county government had been informed of and had approved – were chased down and body-searched by the forest police.

On a positive note, in March 2008, the government agreed to grant the Thao, who number only 600 and are facing extinction, the title to 165 hectares beside Sun Moon Lake, with a further 1,700 hectares to be co-managed by the Thao and the government.

More than 98 per cent of the educational materials used by Aboriginal children in Taiwan are based on a non-Aboriginal viewpoint. According to a 2009 UNESCO report, the languages of all 14 of Taiwan's officially recognized indigenous groups are threatened with extinction. Aboriginal groups are demanding that the government enact an indigenous languages development law to better protect tribal languages, and ease accreditation requirements for tribal language teachers so that more people speaking indigenous languages can be allowed to teach Aboriginal children their mother tongue at elementary schools.