Ayeyarwady farms suffer from labour shortage
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Rural areas of Ayeyarwady Region are facing their worst shortage of farm-workers, as people migrate to cities in search of work, farmers said.
"I searched for workers in my village and nearby but found no one. Nearly everyone went to Yangon to seek work. Farmers received help only from their relatives," said Kyaw Win, a farmer from Kyonemange Township.
Farm workers are still available for farmlands near urban areas, but only for high wages.
"If we want to keep them here, we have to offer higher wage, between Ks 2,000 and Ks 3,000 a day. And there are no more teams of female farm workers in the villages as we had before," said farmer Thein Aung from Kangyidauk Township.
Although the government and private companies have tried to assist local farmers with agricultural machinery to relieve the labour shortages in the region, the burden of the shortages has grown worse year after year as farmers have not been able to modernise their farming systems. The availability of modern agricultural machinery remains limited.
