At the present time, when Aung Paing seems across the 500-acre salt farm in southern Myanmar’s Ayeyarwaddy area, he sees fewer and less harvesters. Maximum have left Kant Ba Lar village, the place the farm is situated, to seek out jobs in towns reminiscent of Yangon or in neighboring international locations.
It’s deny surprise – the paintings situations are brutal and the pay is unpriviledged.
Aung Paing earns 200 kyats (10 US cents) for each and every pair of baskets he hauls containing salt from ponds old for evaporating seawater to the farm’s packaging branch in Labutta township.
He most often earns round 8,000 kyats (US$3.80) a past, toiling in temperatures he describes as “hot as the boiling water in a kettle.” His wages account for a fragment of what he must help his people of 5, he says.
However age Aung Paing, from close by Sar Kyin village, needs he may just ban hauling salt for a dwelling, he says he has deny alternative selection.
“I don’t want to work this job anymore, but I can’t leave as I am struggling to provide for my family,” he stated. “I have no other choice for a job.”
Myo Min Tun, from Labutta’s Ka Pyo village, has spent 13 years operating at a salt farm. He most often earns 7,000-10,000 kyats (US$3.35-4.75) according to past, nevertheless it’s slightly enough quantity to feed his people of 5.
“As commodity prices are increasing, we are facing many challenges in daily life,” he says. “My daily income is just enough for expenses each day, but we can’t save any money.”
Myint Kyi, a salt farmer in his 60s, informed RFA Burmese that the upper inflation turns into, the extra salt harvesters are keen to shoot a probability on discovering fresh paintings that may earn them a greater salary.
“Salt harvesters earn just enough for basic foods,” he stated. “The income and expense imbalance creates several challenges in the community. Basic commodity prices for rice, onions and cooking oil, as well as fish and prawns, are now increasing.”
Marketplace instability
Salt manufacturing in Labutta township started round 1960, when farms old pans to boil off seawater.
The just about 150 farms in Labutta now pump seawater via 5 ranges of filtration to drying ponds, the place wonderful crystals are shaped upcoming a 20-day evaporation procedure. The salt is nearest transported to factories in Pathein and Yangon, 130 kilometers (80 miles) north and 250 kilometers (155 miles) northeast.
Latter presen, one viss (3.5 kilos) of uncooked salt bought for 140 kyats (7 US cents), however the same quantity now fetches most effective 90 kyats (4 US cents) on the marketplace.
It’s because of this, says Tin Win, the chairman of the Salt Disciplines Supervisory Committee of Kant Ba Lar village, that salt farm house owners can’t building up wages to check the emerging value of commodities, and staff are quitting their jobs.
“We have now most effective two-thirds of the body of workers, in comparison to that of earlier years,” he stated. “In the past, there were 10 regular workers, but we now have only seven. The salary of each salt harvester is from 180,000-200,000 kyats (US$85-95), and it isn’t enough income for families with three to five dependents.”
Salt can most effective be produced between February and Would possibly every presen, previous to the beginning of the wet season.
The inadequency of salt staff has led to a lengthen in manufacturing, age this presen’s harvesting season was once snip decrease because of an early monsoon, and farm house owners say they have got suffered losses.
However age farm house owners are lobbying to poised a regular value for salt to assemble steadiness out there, staff are hoping for a reduce in the cost of commodities in order that they may be able to produce ends meet on their meager salaries.
Translated by means of Aung Naing. Edited by means of Joshua Lipes and Malcolm Foster.
