Society
For displaced, letting go is hard to do
By Hu Yinan (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-05-14 08:10
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Unwelcome guests
Fang Fuzhi, Fang Tiesuo's aunt, moved to a township called Menglou in Dengzhou as part of trial migration efforts last August. Moving from the countryside to a semi-urban neighborhood, she complained she now has no place to burn firewood, the staple source of power in rural China. "Coal is way too costly by farmers' standards," she said.
Practical concerns like this loom large for the SNWD migrants.
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Many are confused by the sharp rise in daily spending. Since they no longer have backyards to grow vegetables, migrants are forced to buy groceries from nearby markets. The farmland they have been allotted in their new villages is also often kilometers away, making it hard to harvest crops on time.
Another common fear is acceptance. Xing Jianlin, a cadre in Xichuan's western Liujiaquan village, said that when he secretly visited the area where many of his neighbors will be moved to by August, he found the existing inhabitants "did not welcome" the new arrivals.
"The farmland that will be distributed to us was taken away from these people," he said. "They didn't willingly give it away. There's a strong sense of rejection."
Wang Shushan, head of the SNWD project office in Henan, acknowledged migrants face numerous difficulties and that longstanding socioeconomic conflicts may erupt during relocation. "To resolve these conflicts, Henan will pursue the relocation work with all its might," he said.
In addition, the tens of thousands of farmers who will be left behind to till the arable land that will remain above the county's heightened water level - 172 meters - complain of feeling forgotten. As the large-scale migration is not scheduled until the summer, no policy is yet in place to address the future of those ordered to remain by the Yangtze River Water Resources Commission. Once the majority of local residents are relocated, those left behind will have to find a way to survive without roads, markets and schools.
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Among the 89 people who will be staying in Beigou village is Wang Hongqi and his family. He argues the land they will get - 0.23 mu (0.015 hectare), significantly less than the national per capita average of 1.38 mu - is "no way enough". What is worse, much of the land is covered with stone ballasts, unsuitable for even cows to plow on, let alone machinery.
"You may call this a necessary sacrifice but our fathers already sacrificed themselves in 1973 when they were asked to move here from the plains to build Danjiangkou dam," said the father of three. "Why us again? And what about our children's education?
He also fears his community, which is surrounded by hills on three sides and the Han River on the other, and is accessible only on foot, will be further isolated once the village is relocated.
Returning home
Even those who do pack up, hit the road and start living elsewhere this summer, some might return after failing to blend in with their new environment, experts said.
Around 1.27 million people have already been displaced since the Three Gorges Dam project's migrant relocation program began in 1993. Dozens of Chinese newspapers and magazines carried reports recently about people going back to the towns they were forced to leave because of the project.
Li Haizi, 46, returned to his native Guojiaqu in 1980, seven years after being moved during construction of Danjiangkou Dam. Without hukou in his village (it was transferred to his new home when he was relocated), he claims that he and hundreds of others in Guojiaqu neither receive any farming subsidies, nor take part in local elections. Without proper status, they were not even eligible to join the army, he said.
More than 7,000 migrants from earlier dam projects in Xichuan have returned to their native villages, according to county annals.
Lei Hengshun, a professor with Chongqing University who has spent the past 17 years researching the Three Gorges Dam region, urged authorities to play down the status of migrants over time so as to help them develop a sense of identity and belonging.
"The migrant issue in China is one that's extremely complicated," he said. "We can't simply conclude that it's really good based on just a handful of good examples, or say it's all bad based on some bad experiences. We need to be more cautious."
