Young Chinese chase elusive dream of prosperity in boom town
SHENZHEN, China, Aug 1 (AFP) - Twenty-year-old Chen Jing left home without
telling her parents to seek work and adventure in the southern Chinese boom town of
Shenzhen. A month later she is down to her last few dollars and is still without a job.
"If I can't find anything this week, I'll have to go home," she said.
In recent years hundreds of thousands of young people like her have left villages and
small cities to flock to the town created by Deng Xiaoping in 1980 as China's bold
experiment in free market capitalism.
But in the past year it has become hard to find work even in this city bordering Hong
Kong, one of the most economically successful in China.
"Thirty percent of them are forced to go back home because they can't find work,"
said Zhong Zhiping, director of the Shenzhen Women's Employment Market.
Jobs were easy to find in the past. The city, classed as a special economic zone,
attracted a tide of domestic and foreign investment with its lower tax rates and fewer
bureaucratic hassles.
But the first of China's special economic zones is undergoing a crisis.
Investors are moving factories further inland to take advantage of cheaper labour and
land, leaving few low-skilled factory jobs.
Failing to compete with its inland counterparts, the city is now struggling to transform
itself from a low-value manufacturing zone to a high-technology center.
Many of the job seekers are caught unprepared. Even typical service jobs require
higher skills than they can offer.
"Now office clerks need to know how to use computer software and the Internet.
Before all they needed to do was type," Zhong said.
The regional economic downturn only made the problems more apparent as
investment from Hong Kong, one of the city's biggest sources of capital, slowed.
Once able to boast unbelievable growth rates of 45 percent, last year's gross domestic
product in the city fell back to 14.5 percent and this year's is expected to drop further
to 13 percent.
Unemployment is at 2.45 percent, less than half the national rate. But in calculating the
jobless rate Shenzhen excludes non-locals, who make-up a whopping 67 percent of
the total population of four million.
But the city is still a magnet for China's jobless.
"Very few have friends or relatives when they come here. They go through a lot of
hardship, eating just one meal a day," said Deng Ruijiao, an employee at the Shenzhen
Good Friend Employment Market.
Chen, unwilling to spend her life minding a relative's convenience store, arrived in
Shenzhen with 4,000 yuan (500 dollars), her life savings.
Like many out-of-towners, her first stop was a 10 yuan-per-night motel.
"I gave them the money. They took my ID. I walked into the cramped dormitory room
and saw a woman with a big bruise on her face, smoking in bed. I thought 'No, I
cannot sleep here'. I was so scared," Chen recalled.
Many of these hole-in-the-wall dormitories are located near employment agencies.
Their phone numbers are spray-painted on bridges and lamp posts near the train
station to catch the attention of the daily arrivals.
Scams abound to lure eager job-hunters into parting with what little money they have,
Deng said.
Chen lost about 400 yuan of her savings to a company that offered her a job selling
red wine. They did not pay her a basic salary and she soon quit because she could not
make any sales.
Many people settle in the end for jobs that pay only 400 yuan per month -- not much
better than inland jobs considering the higher cost of living in Shenzhen.
It is not uncommon to see six to eight grown men fighting to carry the bags off buses
coming in from other cities to earn a few yuan.
Government officials have stepped up identification checks and send home those
without proper permission to stay.
But despite the difficulties newcomers often immediately feel at home in a city built by
immigrants from all over China.
"I liked the city from the start. I've made so many good friends here who have helped
me and I've learned so much," Chen said. "I would never have got this experience if I
had stayed in my home town."
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