Many buildings in Taiwan have survived earthquakes, but some appear to have fallen over like toys. This, say experts, is a sign that engineers did not pay enough attention to the foundations, or that the quake virtually turned the soft sediment below into a “liquid”—meaning the apartments should not have been constructed in these locations in the first place. According to Dr. David Petley, of the UK’s Portsmouth University, there are widespread occurrences in Taiwan where building codes are ignored and where development has occurred in locations where it should not have been allowed. Having worked on government-backed risk reduction projects in Taiwan since 1991, Dr. Petley further pointed out that there’s quite a lot of illegal construction work going on in Taiwan as a result of the very rapid development.
However, seismologists and engineers say that the government’s use of three building codes formulated to counter the threat of earthquakes may have spared the island from a death toll far higher than that now being revealed. For instance, Walter Mooney, of the US Geological Survey, conducted a research comparing Taiwan’s preparedness for earthquakes with that of Turkey, and found that Taiwan has been doing a good job: Whereas an estimated 65% of buildings in Turkey were illegally constructed, failing many safety tests, Taiwan has been largely successful in enforcing its own laws.
This passage was written mainly to ________.