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Reaping rich memories that flow through a village

By Wang Zhuoqiong (China Daily)
Updated: 2008-10-14 09:09

The majority of his fellow Dacaiyuan villagers also became migrant workers, building skyscrapers or working in assembly lines at factories. There are about 200 million migrant workers in the cities nationwide today.

"The massive migration was possible because of the reform policies after 1978, especially the household responsibility system that took the place of the people's communes and also the relaxation of the hukou or residency system - both freed farmers from their lands," Jervis explained.

Under the household responsibility system, the farming of publicly owned land was entrusted to individual households through long-term contracts.

The introduction of this system in 1978 was enthusiastically welcomed by Chinese farmers who believed that the harder they worked, the more income they could earn.

In the past, the same job earned the same number of work points regardless of how hard they worked.

Jervis recalled the striking contrast between now and when she first came to the village during her visit in 1972.

"There was no tap water. Electricity only ran for an hour a day. People put a portrait of Chairman Mao in the living room," she said. Today the village is a picture of modern development, with a television and a new refrigerator in living rooms.

Nationwide, 44.9 percent of the population had been urbanized by 2007; an increase of 30 percent over 1978, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.

Interior of farmer Shi Cunji's home, where Jervis lived. [Courtesy of Nancy Jervis]

Dacaiyuan is no exception. Over the last three decades, the village has gone through major changes, some of which threaten its very existence. Rapid urbanization and industrialization have reduced the size of the village and its arable land.

In 1994, Linxian county was upgraded into Linzhou city, in accordance with the local government shifting its focus from agriculture to rural-urban integration and industrialization.

It also marked a step towards modernization. The urban area expanded from 3 sq km to 24 sq km. Most farmers have entered the service industry or run privately owned rural enterprises, according to Linzhou city Party Secretary Wang Chun'an.

With a population of 1 million now, the economy of Linzhou city has grown from 140 million yuan ($20 million) in 1978 to 17.4 billion yuan ($2.5 billion) in 2007, according to Wang.

"People in Linzhou have a long history of leaving their villages to find work elsewhere and are known for their construction skills," Jervis said.

"The 1978 agricultural reforms gave them more than land. It also gave them the freedom to go out and find construction jobs."

"Basically, there was no specific policy on leaving the rural areas, but all restrictions were relaxed," the anthropologist explained. "There were specific policies to end food rationing and government subsidized food prices. This made it easier to live in cities."

Until the early 1990s, the supply of grain and other foods in urban centers was rationed for permanent urban residents.

As production of grain, meat and other foods increased dramatically as a result of the rural household-responsibility system, food rationing ended. This, coupled with rising demand of labors in the city, became the biggest push to allow farmers, who previously had no way of sustaining their life in cities without ration coupons, to migrate into cities.

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