SUNS  4358 Friday 22 January 1998

Beijing, Jan 21 (IPS/Pushpa Adhikari) - In the fifties and sixties, a popular Chinese slogan urged citizens to go to rural and frontier regions and places that needed talent. Today, that slogan may well be "go to foreign countries, big companies and places offering high salaries".

That is exactly what China's educated mass are doing, some to pursue studies overseas, others to land jobs increasingly hard to find at home. This process has been ongoing since the introduction two decades ago of reform and opening-up policy by China's legendary leader Deng Xiao Peng -- but is being heightened by economic and social forces unleashed by the transition from a centrally planned economy to one shaped more by market forces.

China's `brain drain' is also being fuelled by a desire by many families to see their children succeed in 'modern' professions, ranging from computer science to medicine and business. In effect, parents have been encouraging their children, who were in cradle during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) to go abroad. For this, Chinese youth are ready to pay any price.

Going abroad is not new for Chinese elite. From Sun Foiled Sen, the father of the nation of China, Deng Xiao Ping, the father of reform and opening up, and President Zhang of new ideas, all have studied abroad and said to have brought new ideas for China. But majority of Chinese youth today want to go abroad not just for study, but for much more.

A 55-year-old woman, a mother of two grown-ups, says the situation has been changed dramatically among the youth and she is simply unable to understand it. During her youth, she recalls, she dreamed for going to foreign countries -- but not to study or stay permanently but just to
see those places.

But now, Chinese who are educated or have enough money often want to go abroad if they get the chance. "But maybe it is because of the frustration at home," she concedes.

The "going abroad" movement of Chinese students has gone through three stages in history. It began at the end of Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) when a number of Chinese were sent abroad to study industrial technology.
The second stage lasted from the 1930s until 1945, when the people's republic was founded, and the third wave started after China adopted its reform policy which continues to this day.

This last policy exposed Chinese youth, much more than their parents, to the western style of life, often through media. Economic forces play a role as well. An increasing number of college graduates have found it difficult to obtain employment in recent years, compelling them to try
to go abroad.

Students specialising in computing, communications, machinery, electronics, building, economics, automobiles, finance, the English language and clinical medicine generally have no worries about finding an job upon graduation. However, those studying basic theories, management science, agriculture and forestry have not been so much in demand in the last few years.

Li Tong, who graduated with a sociology degree from China's most prestigious university, Beijing University, five years ago, is still unemployed. He has been trying to go abroad since then. He says: "Once I get a chance to escape, I will never come back. Even if I come back, I will not get better job opportunities here."

The changing signals from the labour market stem from China's reform efforts, which put pressure on restructuring the economy and improving efficiency against the previous practice of pouring money into large, State-owned enterprises. Due to this shift, the professions that were previously the major recruiters of college graduates have currently become the main source of mass lay-offs.

College students also tend to have fewer opportunities to enter Communist Party and government offices and their affiliated institutions, as a result of programmes underway to streamline the bureaucracy. Reports from the State Statistics Bureau indicate that only 6% of Chinese on the mainland have received higher education, but an increasing number of college students have found it difficult to obtain employment in recent years.

A recent survey conducted in five renowned Beijing universities shows that majority of their students want to go abroad. Most of them prefer the United States. Some 135,000 Chinese students went to United States to study between 1978 and 1996, according to official media. At the same time, job fairs are spurring fierce competition among college graduates as work units now have a wider choice, including students returning from overseas and experienced staff from other enterprises.

But even for those with higher degrees in science and technology and other demanding professions, the government pay scale is so low that these experts seek better salaries abroad.

Alarmed, the Chinese government recently announced a plan to increase threefold the salaries of selected scientists and professors from 63 universities. But even after "hike" in salary, they will be getting 100,000 yuan or a bit more than $12,000 a year. The Chinese government does support scholars going abroad in order to learn, but hopes this backing will encourage them to come back and serve the country.

Cao Guoxing, secretary general of the China Scholarship Council, says that given the disparities in development across the country, the council will continue to give priority to the state's key development programmes and projects in remote regions when selecting candidates to go abroad.

According to the Department for International Co-operation and Exchange of the Ministry of Education, China has sent more than 200,000 students and scholars to more than 100 countries since the start of reform and opening up policy in 1978. A total of 1,709 scholars are to be sent
abroad this year.

Only about 60% of the scholars who go abroad for higher studies return home, government statistics show. Still, the council's executive vice chairman, Li Dongxiang, says: "The state has been implementing the principle of supporting studies abroad, encouraging scholars to return and giving them freedom to leave and return, and this principle will remain unchanged in the future."