Rural Migration 
cctv.com 07-19-2005 13:08
In today's report from our special series on labor issues in China, we look at another group of workers fueling China's economic growth. They've become part of the urban landscape, which is expanding with their help. But their contribution is coming at a cost. Guo Liying explains why.
Along with concrete and bricks, these fast rising structures in the capital share something else. Rural workers from all over the country are building them.
This is Zheng Qishun. He's 29 years old. He's just one of about 3 million laborers from the countryside, currently working in this city. He said, "I've been working in Beijing for seven years. All the time on construction sites like this one. I can make about twenty thousand yuan each year."
That's about two thousand five hundred US dollars. It's a lot of money in a country where the average salary in rural regions is just 300 US dollars. But leaving their homes has not come without hardships. They use the word "mobile" to describe their lives - simply because they're always on the move. It's the little things like this that count. A simple meal with friends is sometimes enough. But the benefits of working in the big city cannot make up for what they know they have left behind.
Zheng also said, "I miss home a lot. If I'm lucky, I get back once a year. My parents are old and they stay at home with no one taking care of them." Zheng' s mother often thinks of her only son. She lives here with her husband, in Xiaozheng village, over 2000 kilometers to the southeast of Beijing.
They're a farming family from Anhui province.They also have three daughters. But the girls have left home to live with their husbands. It's like the old Chinese saying: "A mother's biggest worry is when her children are far from home."
Mother of Zheng Qishun said, "I miss my children. I only hope they have a decent place to sleep and good food to eat. I hope their employers treat them well."
For China's 900 million rural residents, the land was once the only way to make a living. It's hard work. And usually it's the younger generation that is out in the fields. Today, however, that has changed. This scene is becoming more and more common around China. The children have left for the big cities, leaving their parents to work the land.
Father of Zheng Qishun said, "It's getting a little easier now. The government's policies are more favorable to farmers. My children make more money in the city. I think they made the right choice."
Xiaozheng is just one of the hundreds of thousands of villages around China that are slowly losing their sons and daughters. The old people miss their children. This is the other side of China's economic miracle. Over 100 million farmers have left their land. Only their parents are left behind.
Empty homes like this one are quite common in Xiaozheng village. Young people leave here, hoping to bring prosperity to their homes. However, what they left behind are not just empty homes or deserted farmlands. Something is missing here that money can not bring back."
Zheng Qishun does not know where his life in the big city will lead. And he knows that Beijing is not his home. For now though, it's enough. What the future holds for him, and for tens of millions of workers just like him, no one really knows. But going home may not be a realistic choice.
Editor:Wang Source:CCTV.com
