h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

The following report is extracted from a bulletin released today by Tibet Information Network ( http://www.tibetinfo.net ).
It clearly demonstrates that China's Western Development Campaign is actually damaging rural Tibetans, socially, as well as ecologically.


Prostitution on the rise among Tibetans

Recent reports from Tibet indicate that an increasing number of Tibetan women
from rural areas, particularly in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), are working
as prostitutes. Though the fast growing sex trade is still dominated by Chinese
sex workers, the number of Tibetan prostitutes, still marginal only a few years
ago, has lately been on the rise. Observers unanimously link this change to the
widening economic gap between urban and rural areas, itself a direct side effect
of the current Western Development Drive. Whereas economists express serious
doubts about the sustainability of the economic growth in Tibet, which is artificially
fuelled by heavy subsidy from Beijing, there is little doubt that it has generated
higher levels of disposable income in a few urban centres while leaving the vast
majority of Tibetans who live in rural areas in a state of stagnating poverty.
At the same time, the aggressive consumerism propagated in rural areas by the
increasing penetration of the state controlled media has raised expectations
impossible to fulfil locally. Rural Tibetans are not only poorer, their extremely
low level of education makes their chances of getting a steady and lucrative
job in the cities as good as nonexistent. This discrepancy between high expectations
and the sheer impossibility of fulfilling them appears to lead young female Tibetan
migrants into prostitution, the only realistic quick route to a better standard
of living. Thus in Tibet, prostitution is not just a symptom of poverty, but
is triggered also by the growing prosperity of the few. Although there are real
prospects for Tibetan prostitutes to better their material lot, they benefit
less from prostitution than Chinese sex workers in Tibet, and they face more
social difficulties.