Chang Huang-chang, leader of the squad, said its three local teams in northern, central and southern Taiwan, have stepped up the frequency of random inspections around the country in a bid to stem unlawful dumping.

The move followed an environmentalist's revelation this week that several sites, including a duck farm, in southern Taiwan's Kaohsiung County have been contaminated by toxic material after steel mill residue were illegally dumped there.

Investigations conducted by the EPA after receiving the environmentalist's tip off confirmed that the ducks had exceedingly high levels of the harmful chemical dioxin in them.

Regarding illegal dumping in Taiwan, Chang indicated the Kaohsiung case was not isolated. A company was caught last year by the EPA's northern inspection team to have dropped large amounts of unknown liquid into local rivers in a mountainous area in northern Taiwan's Miaoli County.

The illegal activity was detected by EPA inspectors after they found that trucks were frequently entering and leaving the area on rainy days, Chang said. The company was later found to have stored more than 800 barrels of the toxic substance in a run-down brick factory before they were to dump the substance into nearby rivers, he added.

The EPA has asked the public to quickly inform local or central government authorities of similar pollution cases if they notice suspicious vehicles or persons.

The administration is currently monitoring 175 illegal dump fields of industrial waste; contamination sources in 73 of them have already been removed.

A sense of crisis has risen among Taiwan's people after the dioxin-tainted duck case in the town in Kaohsiung County was revealed. Authorities have ordered the slaughter of about 9,000 contaminated ducks at the farm situated at a landfill in the southern Taiwan county.

(By K. Y. Liu and Flor Wang)