Solving the problem "leaving the countryside but not leaving one's home"

(Baonghean) - Due to difficult family circumstances, limited education and the desire to leave farming and travel far, many rural youth have chosen to leave their hometown to start a business, flocking to industrial parks in the South to work as hired laborers. Without a job in hand and limited education, most workers have unstable incomes, not even enough to cover their daily living expenses.

Living away from home…still poor

When you go to any commune in Nghe An, you will find a deserted village scene, with mostly old people and children at home while most of the young people go to the South to find work. This is understandable because nowadays, it is difficult to find a job in the countryside during the off-season, plus the mentality of young workers not liking farming, while in the factories in the South, the demand for labor is always high. However, finding a stable life in a "foreign land" is not easy because the cost of living in big cities is often expensive. Just the rent, living expenses, gas money for travel... also take up a significant amount of the total monthly income of workers.

Shipbuilding brings stable income to many workers in Nghi Thiet - Nghi Loc.

Meeting Ms. Le Thi Ngoc in Quynh Giang commune, Quynh Luu district when she was going to the Job Introduction Center to register for unemployment benefits after 12 years of working at a leather and footwear company in Binh Duong, she sighed and said: "Working in the South is not worth it, it's very hard and difficult." It was found out that in 2002, when she first came to the South, Ms. Ngoc's starting salary was 600,000 VND/month, at that time gold was only about 400 - 600,000 VND/tael. With that income, she could still save a few taels of gold after a year. But now, even though she earns up to 4 million VND a month, she still can't save much because prices are getting more and more expensive. She mentally calculated: 1 month, 3 sisters renting a room also costs more than 1 million VND, then food, electricity, water, daily expenses. If she tried her best, she could only save 15-20 million VND a year. She had been away from home for 12 years, and calculating her savings, it was not much. Her youth had passed without her getting married. Worried about her daughter, her parents told her to stay home and work in the fields, even though the income was lower, at least she would not have to travel far away from her family.

According to Ms. Lam Thi Que, Head of Unemployment Insurance Department - Provincial Employment Center: The number of people registering for unemployment is always higher at the end of the year than on normal days, most of whom are workers returning from the South. This also shows that workers are no longer interested in working in export processing zones and industrial parks, partly because the income there is too low. Although there are no statistics, she cited evidence: According to regulations, a worker after quitting a job, if he has full documents, will receive unemployment benefits for 6 months at a rate equal to 60% of the actual salary received at the old unit. However, through monitoring, currently most workers only receive 1.5 - 2 million VND, the number receiving 3 - 4 million VND is very small. Thus, on average, a worker only receives 2.5 - 3 million VND per month.

Coming to Nghi Thiet commune (Nghi Loc), Mr. Hoang Van Thai, Secretary of the commune Youth Union, took us to the family of Nguyen Thi Ha, a victim after 2 years of working as a worker in the South. Ha's house is in Bac Thinh hamlet, the most remote and difficult place in the commune. The house is located in the middle of a field, surrounded by ponds and lakes, making it even more desolate. Ha's father, Mr. Nguyen Van Dong, is not yet 50 years old but is already as old as an old man. Ha shyly holds her baby. Looking at the little girl's face, no one would think she has been a mother for more than a year. When asked about her child, Mr. Dong burst into tears.

He said: He and his wife were the only one, Ha, but because the family was poor, no matter how hard they tried, they could only raise their child to grade 5. Then, when Ha was 15 years old, her mother died of heart disease. His wife was gone, so the two of them depended on each other, but because he had a mental illness, he was only conscious a couple of times a month and the rest of the time he had seizures, so he couldn't do anything, and no one wanted to hire him for fear of him having a sudden seizure. Feeling sorry for his father, Ha listened to some women in the neighborhood and went to Binh Duong to apply for a job as a worker at Duc Thanh leather and footwear company. Life was hard, so to save money, the 8 sisters rented a room together. However, after working for two years, without saving much, Ha was tricked by a co-worker in the company into getting pregnant. At 19 years old, she became a mother, not knowing where to turn, Ha took her child back to her hometown. From then until now, for almost a year, every time the story of going to work in the South was mentioned, Ha's father had a seizure and was scared. As for Ha, thinking about that makes her think of the traitor, think of the days of running around, struggling in every way.

Mr. Nguyen Thanh Chuong, Head of Bac Thinh Hamlet, Nghi Thiet Commune, said: Due to the characteristics of Bac Thinh village, half farming, half fishing, with very little agricultural land, most of the young people in the village grow up and go to work far away. Sometimes, almost the entire village is gone, leaving only the elderly and children at home. However, because working in the South is both far away and has low income, the trend of going to the South has recently decreased. Instead, they go to Thailand and Laos to trade. Currently, the whole village has about 60 people working abroad, but the going is mainly spontaneous, going through unofficial channels rather than through companies. Therefore, it is impossible to foresee all the risks.

And there are many sad stories of young workers who choose to leave their homeland to start a career. Many young people who finished high school went to the South and then worked overtime 365 days a year but they still could not cover their daily expenses and countless other "unnamed" expenses. Many people, when they returned home for Tet, still had to rely on the support and help of the Southern provinces and cities.

The "millionaires" of the countryside

While many rural youths leave their hometowns to the South and North to find work, in recent years, many people with the determination to "never leave their homeland" have risen to become "millionaire farmers", contributing to creating jobs and stable income for many local workers. A typical example is Mr. Hoang Minh Khanh, born in 1982, in Hamlet 12, Hung Long Commune, Hung Nguyen, who was honored to receive the Luong Dinh Cua Award for young farmers from the Central Youth Union and was also honored as a typical young face of Nghe An. As the only child in a poor rural family, with parents who were often sick and unable to work, after finishing high school, Khanh had to put his studies on hold to focus on working, producing, supporting his family and participating in local Youth Union activities.

Facing the wave of "leaving home" of his peers, as a youth union secretary and a party member, Khanh always struggled with the question of how to eliminate hunger, reduce poverty for himself and create jobs for young workers in the locality? At first, Khanh intended to learn mechanical welding to open a mechanical workshop, but one day, by chance, passing by fresh flower shops in Vinh City, seeing many Ha Tay people carrying rattan and bamboo woven products to make flower arrangements such as flower baskets, wreaths and gift baskets... to sell, the young man had the idea of ​​opening a rattan and bamboo handicraft production facility. From two empty hands, with his utmost efforts, Hoang Minh Khanh has risen to become a young "millionaire" in the countryside. Up to now, his production facility has up to 16 types of products, attracting dozens of concentrated workers with salaries from 2,000,000 VND - 3,000,000 VND/person/month; Not to mention the large number of regular workers who are people in the village and commune who receive goods to work at home. Every year, Hoang Minh Khanh's facility produces 200,000 - 250,000 products of all kinds with a total revenue of 3.5 - 4 billion VND, minus expenses, net profit is about 500 million VND. In addition to developing the production facility, he also invests in trading some related products such as: Importing foam for flower arrangements from Malaysia; silk flower products, colored paper for flower bouquets from Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi, Bac Ninh, Nam Dinh...

Or like Mr. Tran Song Thanh (Nghia Binh - Nghia Dan) has boldly invested in economic development by building a VAC farm model. With a total annual revenue of over 300,000,000 VND, it has created regular jobs for 5-7 local young workers. As for Mr. Le Cong Thuan from Ky Son hamlet (Tan Ky), after graduating from the intermediate level of the electrical system department of Hanoi University of Electricity, thanks to his ability to speak English fluently, he was accepted to work at a foreign company in Dong Nai, a light job with a stable income, which was the dream of many people at that time, but he realized that "no matter how well he did, he was just working for hire" and he decided to return to his hometown to build a comprehensive livestock farm model starting from raising porcupines, civets, raising pigs, then hatching eggs and trading poultry and chicken breeds, with a total annual revenue of over 300 million VND, a net profit of about 150 million VND, creating regular jobs for 4 workers and 2 seasonal workers. Or like Mr. Nguyen Van Hieu (Hung Xa - Hung Nguyen), he graduated with honors in Agronomy Engineering from Vinh University and was trained for 1 year in farm management in Israel. Hieu decided to build a farm by applying biotechnology and science and technology. Each year, the income is about 575 million VND... They are young people from the countryside with the determination not to accept poverty, gradually overcoming difficulties, with will, effort, creativity, diligence, hard work, daring to think, daring to do, have risen to become rich on their homeland.

What is the solution to the problem of "never leaving home"?

Currently, our province has more than 1 million young people from 16 to 30 years old, of which young people of working age account for 48.83%. According to Mr. Dang Hong Thang - Secretary of Nam Dan District Youth Union, to solve the problem of employment for rural workers, localities must implement rural planning well and have reasonable policies to attract investors and businesses to operate in the area. In fact, in Nam Dan district, thanks to the two garment factories HAIVINA Kim Lien and Hanosimex Textile Factory, jobs have been created for many rural workers. In addition, there should be a mechanism to create conditions and support for individuals and organizations to open small-scale handicraft cooperatives associated with local craft villages to both employ local workers and take advantage of available materials to exploit local potential and strengths.

For example, in Trung Kien Shipbuilding Cooperative (Nghi Thiet, Nghi Loc), in recent years, thanks to the strong development of shipbuilding, it has created jobs for more than 800 rural workers, mainly men working directly in the industry. Some people, after many years of leaving their homeland and failing, have accepted to return to their hometown to start a business, such as Phan Van Cong. After 10 years of struggling in shipyards in Vung Tau, Quang Ninh, Thanh Hoa, for the past two years he has worked at Lu Hien Shipbuilding Complex. Because of his experience, he is paid 300,000 VND/day. Cong said: "Working at home is still better, because I can live near my wife and children, not in a "three or four pot" house, and I don't have to spend money on transportation and other expenses."

According to Dang Minh Chinh - Head of the Provincial Youth Union's Urban Workers' Youth Department: Our province has strengths in agriculture, forestry, fishery and services. If unemployed youth or youth working for hire in other localities are trained and oriented in a career that is suitable to the actual conditions and strengths of the locality, and at the same time, there is a policy to support loans to invest in production equipment, then rural youth will not have to struggle in a "foreign land" but instead they will have the opportunity to get rich right in their homeland.

In recent years, the Youth Union has actively coordinated with all levels and sectors to support rural youth in activities such as transferring knowledge and techniques of livestock and crop farming, supporting loans to develop production and business; coordinating vocational training and creating jobs for thousands of young workers. Each year, the Youth Union at all levels has created conditions for 7,000 young people to find jobs at home and abroad, over 15,000 young people have received career orientation, more than 26,890 young people and young households have access to preferential capital with a total outstanding loan of nearly 600 million VND. Through preferential capital sources, new jobs have been created for 10,250 young people. Many good production and business models have been replicated. Currently, the whole province has more than 4,000 youth farms at home, in low-lying and hilly areas with an area of ​​1 - 15 hectares, with an income of 30 - 100 million VND/year. From 2008 to 2013, our province had 33 typical young people who were recognized and received the Luong Dinh Cua Award for outstanding young farmers nationwide. They are all typical young people who directly develop the economy with models of livestock and crop farms in the locality... This proves that if rural youth have knowledge, skills, determination and aspiration to become rich, they are the pioneer force in exploiting the potential and advantages of their homeland to develop the economy, contributing significantly to solving employment for local workers.

However, currently, young people have not had much access to capital. Loan policies are still limited and not really open in terms of capital sources and lending forms. Therefore, there needs to be specific directions to promote youth support policies, especially capital support policies, market research, development of new models, new occupations to increase income, helping rural youth get rich right in their homeland. Youth Union and Association organizations need to promote their role as a bridge in developing the linkage of the four "Farmers, scientists, entrepreneurs, and the State" to improve production efficiency, expand markets, produce goods with high productivity and quality; encourage forms of sponsorship and support from organizations, individuals, and young entrepreneurs with new production and business ideas, especially post-harvest products. Guide to building and developing the Youth Club for good economic performance at the commune level to connect and gather good economic youth in rural areas to share experiences and support each other in socio-economic development. Vocational training must also be innovated in the direction of linking with the local economic development planning program, social needs, and aspirations of workers; training must be linked with job introduction and search.

But the most important thing is that young workers in rural areas must be self-motivated, have the spirit of daring to think and do, determine and choose the right direction that is suitable to their own abilities and actual conditions, their families' as well as the potential and strengths of the locality to be determined to get rich legitimately right on their homeland.

Photo story:Khanh Ly - My Ha