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Сми о Казахстане (3-17 ноября 2008 гг.) Оглавление

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Информационный сайт EurasiaNet. org, November 14, 2008, Joanna Lillis, KAZAKHSTAN: COTTON HARVEST FAILS TO PROVIDE RICH PICKINGS
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Информационный сайт EurasiaNet. org, November 14, 2008, Joanna Lillis, KAZAKHSTAN: COTTON HARVEST FAILS TO PROVIDE RICH PICKINGS


This year’s cotton harvest in Central Asia has been accompanied by the usual controversies over child labor, water shortages, and low returns for backbreaking work. Cotton pickers from Uzbekistan continue to be attracted by higher rates of pay in Kazakhstan, raising concern that a labor shortage in Uzbekistan results in more children being sent to the cotton fields.

As the end of the harvest approaches, Kazakhstan expects the crop to be three quarters of last year’s, due to unfavorable weather and a crop replacement policy that was instituted to address the water issue.

"We are now giving more attention to forage crops," Zhamantay Beysenbayev, deputy head of Maktaaral District in Southern Kazakhstan Region, told EurasiaNet. South Kazakhstan is the country’s only cotton-growing region, and Maktaaral, which means Island of Cotton, produces around half of Kazakhstan’s total cotton output. This year Maktaaral District expects to harvest around 200,000 tons, 36,000 tons down on last year, from 100,000 hectares planted with cotton against last year’s 122,000 hectares.

Kazakhstan’s overall harvest total is projected to be around 335,000 tons this year, Kanatbek Ospanbekov, deputy head of South Kazakhstan Region’s Agriculture Directorate, said November 6. This is roughly 25 percent lower than last year’s 448,400 tons, which was slightly up on the 435,300 tons reaped in 2006.

Reasons for the lower yield include the elements, which brought hail and rain but also drought, and a reduction in land sown with cotton this year. The 2007 harvest was reaped from 205,000 hectares, but this year 162,000 hectares were sown; the 21 percent reduction largely explains the fall in the harvest.

Irrigation has been a particular problem this year, local farmers say. "There wasn’t enough water," Oralbek Zhanakov told EurasiaNet as he oversaw cotton pickers in a field belonging to his family. The season started badly after hail destroyed crops which took a month to replant, while a dry summer and rainfall during the picking season (late August to mid/late November) also affected the crop. "This year’s the worst," a local farmer who has grown cotton on a smallholding for five years told EurasiaNet on condition of anonymity.

The government is moving to resolve water shortages in southern Kazakhstan, spending $500 million to create the Koksaray reservoir, with a capacity of 2-3 billion cubic meters. It will take water from the Syrdarya River in winter and spring, preventing floods in the wet season and providing irrigation water in the dry season. Koksaray is due for completion in 2012, but it should start accumulating up to 1 billion cubic meters of water next winter.

Locals are eyeing the new reservoir with hope, but many realize it will not solve all their problems. The main gripe of farmers and laborers is low returns for their toil. Cotton pickers were paid 10 tenge (8 cents) per kilogram during the early part of this harvest, while farmers say they struggle to get by on the prices they receive for the cotton, which they sell by the ton to collection points. Some farmers say the going rate this year at times was 50 tenge (42 cents) per kilogram, far below the 75 tenge (63 cents) which was officially recommended after a meeting of cotton producers and the local government in September. One local farmer said it needs to sell for at least 90 tenge (75 cents) for him to make a profit. "[The price] doesn’t justify the labor," agreed the head of a cotton collection point near the district center of Zhetisay. "But what’s to be done? It can’t just be left sitting in the fields."

The rate for pickers increased from 10 tenge per kilogram early in the harvest to 17 tenge (14 cents) later. Rates are low, but employment alternatives are few. "The male population is all unemployed. There’s no work," said the local farmer. "Cotton’s considered the main source of wealth here," he added.

Much of the cotton in Kazakhstan is picked by Uzbek migrant workers, legal and illegal, who cross the porous borders, attracted by the higher wages that they can earn in Kazakhstan than back home. While Kazakhstani pickers complain about low rates, the migrants seem satisfied. "Picking cotton in Kazakhstan is attractive for Uzbek cotton pickers." Naubet Bisenov, an analyst at the Almaty-based Institute for Economic Strategies-Central Asia told EurasiaNet. Reports from Uzbekistan this year suggest pickers are paid 40 sums (3 cents) per kilogram at state-set rates, far lower than Kazakhstan’s market-set rates. State-set picking quotas are 60-80 kilograms per day in Uzbekistan, yielding a daily income of $1.80-$2.40. A laborer picking the same amount in Kazakhstan would stand to earn in the range of $8.40 to $11.20.

Migrant laborers are vulnerable to mistreatment. One farmer told EurasiaNet he had hired a group who had not been paid by their last employer for cotton picked. "Like any other labor migrants, the rights of cotton pickers aren’t protected and their employers may try to exploit them," Bisenov said. "Their treatment depends on the employer and the conditions negotiated by the employer and the middlemen who recruit Uzbeks in Uzbekistan for work in Kazakhstan. Not all of them come via middlemen, but many turn to their services because they may never have left their villages before and they’re afraid of traveling abroad."

As migrants reap Kazakhstan’s harvest, there is a danger that Uzbekistan’s labor shortfall in rural areas is compensated by sending more children to pick cotton. The government has officially banned child labor following pressure from Western cotton importers. However, recent reports issued by labor rights groups have documented that the practice is continuing.

"The effect of the large-scale outflow of Uzbek labor to foreign countries, for example for picking cotton in Kazakhstan, is shortages of labor to pick cotton in Uzbekistan itself, and this situation forces the local authorities to recruit schoolchildren and students to pick cotton," Bisenov said. "This in turn creates all kinds of problems for these children, from falling behind in their education programs to serious heath problems."