National Taiwan University of Science and Technology (NTUST, Taiwan Tech) actively supports and organises events and programmes that promote the conservation and sustainable use of land, including forests and wild land. Coordinated by the Center for Sustainable Development and Institutional Research, together with the Environmental Safety Office, the Center for General Education, the Departments of Architecture and Civil & Construction Engineering, the Graduate Institute of Digital Learning and Education, and several University Social Responsibility (USR) teams, NTUST brings land conservation into campus events, local communities and international learning, in line with UN SDG 15 (Life on Land).
Each year the Center for Sustainable Development and Institutional Research, with the Environmental Safety Office and USR teams, organises the NTUST Sustainability Week and the Aspire Higher Festival. These combine talks on sustainability in higher education and campus ESG action, promote ecological protection and the sustainable management of natural resources among students and staff, and reach out to neighbouring schools and communities to build an inclusive sustainability network.
From 17 to 21 November 2025, NTUST held its Sustainability Week under the theme “Next and Tomorrow, United for Sustainability Together”, co-organised by the Center for Sustainable Development and Institutional Research, the Environmental Safety Office and USR teams. Events included a lecture on international trends in higher-education sustainability and ESG standards, a talk on marine waste and sustainable renewal, and the 2025 International Symposium on Intelligent Net-Zero Buildings with speakers from Hongik University (Korea), the University of Tsukuba (Japan), an Indonesian institute and Taiwan’s Ministry of the Interior. Together they helped students and staff understand the sustainable stewardship of land and natural resources, from policy and the built environment to daily life.
Related news and websites:
▸ [2025-11] NTUST Center for Sustainable Development & Institutional Research | 2025 NTUST Sustainability Week series (Next and Tomorrow, United for Sustainability Together) https://po.ntust.edu.tw/p/406-1059-141845,r763.php?Lang=zh-tw
▸ [2024-12-20] Commercial Times | Embedding sustainability and social responsibility in campus DNA: NTUST wins the 2024 National Sustainable Development Award https://www.ctee.com.tw/news/20241220700579-431204
The Sustainability Week’s school series took workshops off campus: a board-game workshop and environmental disaster-prevention class at Fanghe Experimental High School (19 November), and “Sustainable Living” and “Sustainable Diet” classes at Gongguan Elementary School (21 and 27 November). The 2nd NTUST Aspire Higher Festival (2023) focused on sustainability, running seven workshops that invited nearby primary and secondary schools, borough chiefs and residents, alongside the “Let’s Travel Sustainable Campus” exploration activity. In September 2026, NTUST hosted the Ministry of Education’s USR co-empowerment event “New Horizons for Sustainability: Innovation, Diffusion and International Collaboration”, bringing together practitioners from Taiwan, Japan, the US and Indonesia.
Related news and websites:
▸ [2023-11-09] Commercial Times | 2nd NTUST Aspire Higher Festival opens with sustainability as its theme https://www.ctee.com.tw/news/20231109701290-431202
▸ [2023-11] NTUST Campus Bulletin | 2023 NTUST Aspire Higher Festival – Let's Travel Sustainable Campus https://bulletin.ntust.edu.tw/p/16-1045-118466.php?Lang=zh-tw
▸ [2026-09-21] Central News Agency (CNA) | NTUST gathers USR practitioners from Taiwan, Japan, the US and Indonesia: from local revitalization to international co-creation https://www.cna.com.tw/postwrite/chi/444750
Through its USR teams, NTUST works in Indigenous communities, mountain forests and farming villages across Taiwan, turning academic expertise into concrete action for land conservation and sustainable use: environmental education in Indigenous areas, regeneration of farmland and rural public space, and land-friendly management in a reservoir catchment.
Led by Associate Professor Ying Wang of the Center for General Education, the USR project “Project LET'S Go!” is built on “Local Engagement × Citizen Science × Sustainable Action” and works with Indigenous communities at Tongmen Elementary School (Xiulin Township, Hualien), Chishang Junior High School (Taitung) and Dong'ao Elementary School (Yilan). In August 2025 the project signed an MOU with Taipower’s Eastern Power Plant; with the Mugua River and Mt. Qilai as its setting, it promotes green-energy education, local video documentation and revitalisation of the Mugua River Story House, helping children understand the links between forests, rivers and energy. Working with the Dongyue Atayal community, it also brings traditional Atayal houses and culture into the curriculum so students learn first-hand how Indigenous people live with the land. The 2026 summer programme continues at sites in Hualien and Taitung.
Related news and websites:
▸ [2025-08-21] Taiwan Tech News (EN) | From Indigenous Classrooms to Engineering Sites: Project LET'S Go! partners with Taipower's Eastern Power Plant https://www.ntust.edu.tw/p/406-1000-140045,r1182.php?Lang=en
▸ [2022-09-30] NOWnews | NTUST USR co-learning: university volunteers introduce Atayal traditional houses to schoolchildren https://www.nownews.com/news/5943420
▸ [2026] STUST forwarded announcement | 2026 NTUST x Project LET'S Go! Summer Program (Tongmen Elementary, Hualien; Chishang Junior High, Taitung) https://news.stust.edu.tw/id/93281
The Department of Architecture leads the USR-Hub project “From Field to Stage: A Place-making Experiment”. In 2026 it signed an MOU with Waseda University, the University of Shiga Prefecture, Guanshan Township Office and Guanshan Farmers’ Association to plan the public space of the “Rice School”, a former wartime granary. Besides renovating the existing granary stage, the plan adds an outdoor “Autumn Stage” in the rice paddies south of the site, so farmland serves both as agricultural landscape and cultural venue, and reuses driftwood left by Typhoon Morakot as circular building material. A related adaptive-reuse proposal won the Gold Award (Sustainable Revitalisation and Reuse) in the 2025 Taiwan Sustainable Architecture Design Student Competition. In 2023 the department had already held a 50-person East Asian Urban and Architectural Design International Workshop at Guanshan’s Riverside Park, the Rice School and the old street.
Related news and websites:
▸ [2026-02-26] Central News Agency (CNA) | NTUST Architecture partners with Japan in Guanshan, Taitung to transform rural public space https://www.cna.com.tw/postwrite/chi/426734
▸ [2023-08-14] Central News Agency (CNA) | NTUST international workshop in Guanshan inspires place-based architectural thinking https://www.cna.com.tw/news/ahel/202308140028.aspx
▸ [2023-08-14] United Daily News (udn) | NTUST international workshop in Guanshan inspires place-based architectural thinking https://udn.com/news/story/6885/7367336
Associate Professor Chia-Chun Ho’s team (Civil and Construction Engineering) works in Pinglin, New Taipei, inside the Feitsui Reservoir catchment that supplies about six million people, addressing the land-use conflict between watershed protection and tea farming. The team developed slow-release, low-phosphorus fertiliser and installed vegetated retention (low-impact development, LID) facilities that cut phosphorus runoff and reduce carbon emissions by about 500 kg per hectare per year, and provides technical support and training for tea farmers. In November 2024, NTUST, the Taipei Water Management Branch (Water Resources Agency), tea farmers and companies held a results conference on water-quality conservation and low-carbon tea and signed a letter of intent. The project won the Excellence Award (Industry Co-Creation) at the 2026 Global Views USR Awards.
Related news and websites:
▸ [2024-11] Money Weekly | Water-quality conservation & low-carbon tea results: Taipei Water Management Branch, NTUST, Pinglin tea farmers and companies https://www.moneyweekly.com.tw/_Article?AID=161110
▸ [2026-04-30] Taiwan Tech News (ZH) | NTUST wins two 2026 Global Views USR Awards https://www.ntust.edu.tw/p/406-1000-147199,r167.php?Lang=zh-tw
▸ [2026-04-30] Taiwan Tech News (EN) | Taiwan Tech wins two top honors at 2026 Global Views Monthly USR Awards (Feitsui Reservoir project details) https://www.ntust.edu.tw/p/16-1000-148245.php?Lang=en
NTUST encourages multinational student teams to go beyond campus into Taiwan’s forests, protected areas and local communities, to learn how wild land is conserved and used sustainably, and to carry those lessons back to their home countries.
Master’s students from Indonesia, Kenya, Vietnam and Taiwan at the Graduate Institute of Digital Learning and Education formed the team “ECO 4TUNE” and designed their own five-day SDGs journey for the 10th Explore Taiwan 120h competition (2024), co-organised by the CTCI Education Foundation and the Taiwan Institute for Sustainable Energy, winning third place. Their most memorable stop was the Luanshan Forest Museum in Taitung, where a Bunun guide led them along traditional hunting trails and they shared Bunun meals and made mochi, gaining insight into how Indigenous people live in harmony with the forest; the site links nature and culture to SDGs on quality education, sustainable communities and life on land. The team also studied New Taipei Metropolitan Park, which integrates flood prevention with ecological protection and recreation (SDGs 11, 13, 15), and visited the Hualien District Agricultural Research and Extension Station. Through NTUST’s Digital Fellowship Program, team members shared Taiwan’s sustainability practices with schools in Kenya and Indonesia.
Related news and websites:
▸ [2024-05-13] CNA / United Daily News (udn) | NTUST multinational student team shines in Explore Taiwan 120h SDGs competition https://udn.com/news/story/6928/7959958
▸ [2024] Taiwan Tech News (EN) | Taiwan Tech forms international student team for customized Taiwan SDGs exploration tour https://www.ntust.edu.tw/p/16-1000-126348.php?Lang=en
▸ [2024] NTUST Secretariat News (EN) | ECO 4TUNE visits Luanshan Forest Museum and New Taipei Metropolitan Park https://www.secretariat.ntust.edu.tw/p/16-1063-126101.php?Lang=en
NTUST’s Engineers in Action programme regularly takes local and international students into rural communities. In summer 2025, NTUST formed its first joint international team with partner universities from Japan and Indonesia for a 10-day field programme in Dong'ao, Yilan, combining local environmental improvement with Indigenous culture so that international students take part directly in caring for Taiwan’s land and communities.
Related news and websites:
▸ [2025-06-30] Taiwan Tech News (ZH) | NTUST Engineers in Action join Japan and Indonesia to empower rural Dong'ao https://www.ntust.edu.tw/p/406-1000-138039,r167.php?Lang=zh-tw
▸ [2025-06-30] Taiwan Tech News (EN) | Taiwan Tech engineers team up with Japan and Indonesia to empower rural communities https://www.ntust.edu.tw/p/16-1000-138260.php?Lang=en