Fishing village experience
For their production or living, early fishermen made fishing gears, weaved fishing nets, and produced daily necessities or toys with local materials and traditional wisdom. Over time, many fishing village cultures and memories have gradually achieved certain values and been preserved or translated into experience activities for marketing promotion. Since 1985, the government has been providing guidance to women and teenagers in fishing villages, greatly improving family hygiene, living environment, dietary nutrition, consumption education, parental education, and guidance for the elderly through policies such as overall community construction. Through the accumulation of social capital, many handicrafts of fishing villages can be passed on to the younger generations as well as visitors. Through tour guiding to fishing villages and itineraries, people can experience the fishing village culture, such as production experiences of fishing nets, fishing gear, gyotaku, fish balls, and drying and salting fish. In some fishing villages, returning youth groups have promoted fishing village culture by combining network information as well as cultural and creative design. Tourists are provided with diverse services, such as Keelung for A Walk, Zhengbin Art, and Tainan City Sangu Community.
With the continuous improvement of Taiwanese living standards, fishing villages are constantly thinking about how to combine their own culture and creativity, so as to make the culture more delicate, tasteful, and attractive. For example, Tamsui Fishermen’s Association teaches how to make paper boat models of traditional sampans to provide people with hands-on experience; Ziguan Fishermen’s Association designs packaging as cultural and creative products for tourists to experience hand-made fishing baskets; Hsin Kang Community in Yuang’an District, Kaohsiung City designs common tetrapods near coasts as origamis, which are a type of cultural and creative products; and Guishan Island Community in Yilan County maintains traditional octagonal kites that can form a 72-angle kite through the cooperation of many people. Hsing-hua Hu, the former Deputy Minister of Council of Agricultural, Executive Yuan, considered that “fishery culture must adapt to the interaction between people and culture. People obtain physical and mental enjoyment and learn knowledge from participation experience. Fishery culture can be enriched and fully promoted through the feedback of participants.” Through actual participation in fishing village experience activities and “learning by doing”, people can enhance their understanding of fishing villages’ culture and environment and spur the economic value of the villages.
