Left-behind women struggle as husbands migrate
0 
China had about 230 million migrant workers in 2009, of whom about 145 million hunted for jobs outside their home provinces, according to figures provided by the National Bureau of Statistics.
Researchers with the Beijing-based China Agricultural University found, in a two-year survey ending in December 2008, that the "left-behind population" in China's rural areas included 20 million children, 20 million elderly people and 47 million wives.
"Left-behind women are shouldering 85 percent of the family's housework and agricultural production and 62.9 percent of them are physically overstrained," says Prof. Ye Jingzhong, leader of the research team.
Of the 1,200 left-behind wives that Prof. Ye and his team followed in five rural provinces including Anhui, Henan, Hunan, Jiangxi and Sichuan, almost 50 percent said their husbands came home only once every year.
The situation also threatened to disintegrate many rural families, as 8 percent of the women that the team surveyed said they were facing a crisis in their marriage.
These women's health is also worrying, as Prof. Ye has found at least 30 percent of them suffer chronic diseases.
For Tian Jinzhen, growing tobacco alone is an exhausting job. From March to September, she spends at least four hours a day on the plants, spreading pesticide and fertilizer, weeding and watering.
Throughout the year she has to work like a horse, plowing the family's cropland and carrying 40 km of grain -- about her own weight -- in a single harvesting trip.
"Other women carry up to 50 km, but I'm not as strong," says Tian. She suffers chronic pains in the back and knees, a result of overwork.
"When it's time to get up at dawn, I really want to be asleep forever," says Tian. "But I struggle to stand up because the whole family rely on me and I cannot let them down."
Sociologist Tang Yahui says she respects the left-behind women's independence and strong will.
"Women account for 65 percent of China's rural labor force," says Tang, director of the Hunan provincial institute of gender and social development. "They are an important force in China's rural development."
As a petty official looking after women's affairs in the village, Tian Jinzhen says she is helping with the village committee's budgets to buy farm machines with government subsidies. "The new machines will hopefully ease the peasant women's burden."
Impressed by the busy streets and dazzling skyscrapers of Beijing, which she saw during a 2002 trip, Tian Jinzhen says she hopes her village would one day become as rich.
She encouraged women in her village to help each other and increase efficiency in farm work.
She even shot a 120-minute video on rural left-behind children in 2002, urging parents to care more for these kids.
Tian sees opportunities in the village's production of specific products such as homemade liquor, chicken and ham, and plans to set up a collectively-owned business to promote them on the national market.
"When our village becomes rich, residents will find jobs close to their home and no one will be left behind any more," she says.
Go to Forum >>0 Comments