Ｃｈａｎｇｉｎｇ　Ｖｉｌｌａｇｅ　Ｌｉｆｅ

Ｂｙ　ｓｔａｆｆ　ｒｅｐｏｒｔｅｒ　ＬＩ　ＹＡＨＯＮＧ

IN the village where I was born, rising prices are the talk of the town. Jiaojiazhuang is in Hebei Province, some 300 kilometers from Beijing. Surrounded by hills, the village has a population of 1,500, and only one road linking the settlement to the outside world. But since the reform and opening-up policy was instigated 30 years ago, every aspect of life, even for those in such out-of-the-way places, has become tied up with money.

In the past, population mobility in rural areas was extremely limited and money had little impact on villagers self-sufficient lifestyle. Mutual help and the swapping of labor and materials were usually enough to achieve anything within the village, from building houses to obtaining foodstuffs like rice and salt. This started to change when the economy took off following the introduction of economic reforms in 1978. The rural labor force began leaving the countryside to seek better opportunities in the cities. When these people return home, they generally find it more convenient to use cash to pay for services and goods than ask the neighbors for help. As a result, cash is now a part of life in rural areas like never before.

Cash Crops

My mother is an only child, so my grandmother lived with contempt from her in-laws and other villagers, who regarded her as an “unworthy woman.” Offspring, particularly sons, were very important for rural families. More offspring meant more land, and hence more grain, not to mention more labor (farmland was allocated to each family according to its size).

Thirty years ago, grain was the most important property for villagers, not only because it guaranteed the very basic human need for food, but also because it functioned as the main currency in the barter economy that dominated rural China. Grain could be exchanged for almost anything, including labor and materials for house building. This was the case with my family when our house of stone and wood was built 30 years ago. My parents saved enough grain and got in building materials, and then asked other villagers for help with construction. All they had to do was prepare three meals a day for the helping hands and be ready to provide reciprocal labor when other families needed to build a house. Little cash was involved in the whole construction process.

This system of mutual assistance is disappearing from the countryside, and the business consciousness of villagers is growing. Since they can earn money in the cities, few are willing to provide volunteer labor in exchange for just a few decentmeals. Increasingly, rural people have to contract construction out to building companies – just like people in the city.

In 2006, my uncle Jia Guosheng built a house, which cost him RMB 60,000, including RMB 12,000 for the building company. In contrast to the simple abodes of former times, it is a modern-style, reinforced cement structure, complete with well-equipped and finely decorated rooms.

My uncle has been a construction worker in Beijing and Tianjin since 1995, and now earns RMB 100 a day. When you compare this with an annual income of RMB 1,000 from farming, it is easy to see how migrant workers in the city greatly improve their families lives back in their home villages. That is why farmers are swarming to urban centers, even though it often means enduring back-breaking physical work and painful homesickness.

Migrant workers also bring modern knowledge and new ideas back to their hometowns. In addition, the Chinese governments canceling of the agricultural tax and tuition fees for compulsory education has eased the burden on farmers to a certain extent. All these factors have meant that farmers lifestyles and consumption habits have moved considerably closer to their city counterparts. Without the policy of reform and opening-up, my uncle may never have earned RMB 60,000 in his entire life, let alone spent the amount on a new house. Without question, there has been great progress.

From Bartering Grain to Little Red Envelopes

When I was young, labor was not the only thing you could buy with grain. It could be bartered for almost any commodity in the village – coal, vegetables, snacks… I still remember how excited I was when peddlers hawked their wares in the street. At that time, I used grain to barter for cookies. Somehow, using cash does not seem to have the same excitement.

As living conditions have improved in the countryside, villagers demand for pork and eggs has increased greatly. Especially in recent months, prices have soared rapidly. The price of pork, for example, is three times what it was in 1992. Eggs have more than doubled in price from the time my grandmother used to raise chickens and sell eggs in the village market. The price hikes have been fueled by higher demand and falling supply, since few farmers raise pigs or chickens nowadays. Like my uncle, they have converted their sties into carports and prefer to buy meat and eggs in the shops. Crop stalks are also no longer required for fuel, as coal is now widely used.

Changes are also evident in the gifts given for weddings and funerals. Extended family relations are highly valued in Chinas rural areas, and those living in the same village will always contribute gifts to other villagers weddings or funerals as members of an extended family. I remember weddings 15 years ago. Only the rich could hire three tractors and decorate them as wedding vehicles, and villagers would give 1.5 kilograms of wheat as a gift of congratulations. These days, people give red envelopes containing money. The closer your relationship with the family, the more you give. Brides now often require at least five cars for the ceremony. Weddings may cost as much as RMB 20,000 to 30,000.

Looking around my village today, I see little difference between the buildings and those in the city. Since my village has hot springs, the locals have put up many euro-style villas to accommodate urban holidaymakers. But as the multi-story buildings increase in number, the cultivatable land keeps shrinking.

While the countryside is still not as rich as urban areas, villagers now labor all over the country, building much closer links with the outside world. The influx of cash has meant rural life is steadily drawing nearer to urban living standards, with all the benefits and changes a more commercially orientated society brings.