Taipei City Government

Chungyuan Festival (Chinese Ghost Month) celebration is an important religious event in Taiwan. In addition to the conventional way of worshipping, the Department of Civil Affairs (DCA) also provides an online Pudu worshipping website, allowing you to worship anytime anywhere while preserving traditional culture and the environment. Furthermore, you can also participate in the lottery and stand to win 300 fantastic prizes including boutique ticket holders in an exquisite metal box, supermarket gift vouchers, multipurpose touch control eye protection LED desk lamps, and stylish cooler bags, among others.

The burning of joss paper during the Chungyuan Festival serves as a token of respect for wandering spirits, ancestors and lonely souls. Although burning joss paper only accounts for a small part of PM2.5 emissions in the country, due to Taipei’s high population density, burning a large quantity of joss paper at a specific time and space will generate a high concentration of PM2.5 particles that not only affects the quality of residential environment but also causes health risks to those in the vicinity.

The DCA urges the public to support the policy of burning fewer joss sticks or joss paper, or adopt the method of “replacing joss paper with rice”. If the public requires the use of blessed rice, they may download and print the “2019 Blessed Rice Packaging Motif” from the agency’s official website and affix it onto packaged rice to support the policy of “replacing joss paper with rice”.

If you need to burn joss paper, please do not do so openly, as you should prepare a copy of “Taipei City’s Joss Paper Centralized Incineration Pass” and send the joss paper to the incinerator plant for centralized incineration. Furthermore, from now on, citizens may approach various sub-district affairs offices to obtain the “Chungyuan Festival Joss Paper Centralized Incineration Bag” (while supplies last) which they can place joss paper into, or use other containers and send them to various collection points within different sub-districts so that sanitation workers can deliver the joss paper to the incineration plant for centralized incineration.

In order to show respect for religion, the city’s 3 incineration plants are safeguarded by deities all year round to allocate joss money. Moreover, the DCA and Department of Environmental Protection have invited City God Temple of Taipei City to hold the annual worshipping ritual ceremony at the 3 incineration plants on July 30, 2019, therefore citizens can have peace of mind when participating in centralized burning of joss paper.

Additionally, to encourage citizens to burn less joss paper, they are invited to join the online Pudu at the DCA’s online worshipping website (http://bcabdc.civil.taipei/online/) between August 1 (July 1 on the Chinese calendar), 2019 and 17:00 on August 29 and leave their details to partake in the lottery. Lottery participants stand to win practical prizes such as boutique ticket holders in an exquisite metal box and supermarket gift vouchers, among others. In total, 300 lucky prize winners will be drawn during the lottery, so everyone is welcome to join the event.

Centralized incineration services provided by the Taipei City Government include:
1. “Joss Paper Centralized Incineration Bag” (while supplies last) that can be obtained from 456 borough offices free of charge. Alternatively, you can download and print the “Taipei City’s Joss Paper Centralized Incineration Pass” from the DCA’s website and affix it to the joss paper you have packaged for centralized incineration.
2. Citizens may place joss paper in incineration bags, package them and affix the pass on top before delivering them to various collection points in different districts, and they will be picked up by a van and sent for centralized incineration.
3. For companies, apartment buildings, institutions, organizations or religious venues conducting Pudu, they may download and print the “Taipei City’s Joss Paper Centralized Incineration Pass” from the agency’s website, affix it to the separately packaged joss paper and send them to the incineration plant for centralized incineration.

◎For details pertaining to incineration bag, pass, collection points and blessed rice packaging motif, please refer to “Latest News – 2019 Joss Stick and Joss Paper Reduction and Centralized Incineration Campaign Kicks Off” section on DCA’s website (http://ca.gov.taipei/) or Google “deities commend carbon reduction efforts during worship.”