Page 18 - 2019 Annual Report Council of Agriculture, Executive Yuan

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Cultivation: Strolling through the fields
Unit Two: Enhancing Farmers’ Welfare
1. Promoting Farmers’ Occupational-injury Insurance
To improve occupational safety for farmers and create a comprehensive social insurance system for them, the COA, acting on the basis of amendments to the "Farmer Health Insurance Act" promulgated on June 13 of 2018, began offering farmers’ occupational-injury insurance (hereafter FOII) on a trial basis on November 1 of 2018. During the initial trial stage only those who had been insured under the farmers’ health insurance system could join in the FOII program. Starting on August 7 of 2019, retired workers, military personnel, civil servants, or teachers engaged in agricultural work and foreign and mainland Chinese spouses of citizens of Taiwan engaged in agricultural work have been able to apply for FOII based on their status as insured persons in Category 3 under National Health Insurance.
As of 2019 a total of 239,848 people had signed up for FOII. There were a total of 4,011 applications for FOII-related payments, of which 3,876 were for payments for injuries or medical care, 29 were for disability payments, and 106 were for the funeral and interment allowance. Following review of these applications by the Bureau of Labor Insurance of the Ministry of Labor, approval was given for injury and medical care payments in 2,424 cases, for disability payments in 12 cases, and for the funeral and interment allowance in 42 cases.
2. Refining the Farmers’ Health Insurance System
In order to promote the “Small Landowners and Big Full-time Farmers” policy, on November 26 of 2008 amendments were promulgated to Article 7, Paragraph 3 of the "Farmer Health Insurance Act" so that persons who were already insured under farmers’ health insurance (FHI), who are at least 65 years of age and have been in the FHI program for a total of 15 years, and who are no longer undertaking agricultural work because they have commissioned an organization designated by the Competent Authority to assist them in transferring or renting out the entirety of their land, can continue to participate in FHI. On February 13 of 2019 the COA ordered that besides the aforementioned persons, their spouses, lineal blood relatives, in-laws, and daughters-in-law who participated in FHI based on the aforementioned persons’ land transferred or rented out in conformance with agricultural policy, and who are also at least 65 years old and have been in the FHI program for a total of 15 years, can also continue to participate in FHI.
To ensure the right to participate in FHI for actual cultivators of the land who are farming the land of another person by virtue of an oral agreement (hereafter "actual cultivators"), in 2018 the COA amended the "Regulations About Standards for Determinations of the Farmers Engaged in Agricultural Work Applying for Joining In Farmers’ Health Insurance Programs and Examinations of Their Qualifications" and announced the "Operation Directions for the Identification of the Actual Cultivator Engaged in Agricultural Production." The new rules enable actual cultivators to apply to any COA District Agricultural Research and Extension Station for certification that they are actually engaged in agricultural production, on the basis of which they can participate in FHI. In addition, in 2019 the COA amended the aforementioned "Operation Directions" to extend the period of validity for certification to three years, so that actual cultivators can avoid having to reapply for certification each year. In 2019, the COA’s District Agricultural Research and Extension Stations received a total of 322 applications for certification as actual cultivators, approving 237.