Half of South Korean Elderly Are Living in Extreme Poverty

The pension retirees receive is only a quarter of the amount needed for single households, causing many elderly to return to work. 

Elderly South Korean woman. Mctrent. CC BY-NC 2.0

South Korea is known for high rise buildings, luxury skin care and high tech devices. Yet with all of these advances, it has the worst senior poverty rate among developed nations. The population has been struggling to stay off the streets with only 35% of seniors receiving a monthly pension. Fewer than half of seniors receive government assistance and it is only a quarter of the amount needed to cover basic necessities. 

The Confucian tradition of children taking care of their parents is fading in South Korea. In previous generations the elderly turned to their children for financial assistance, often living with their children until their passing. However, the Census has shown that one in three Korean seniors live alone today and six out of ten elderly are supporting themselves. It has become difficult for children to help aging parents due to the expensive cost of living and the high unemployment rate. The country’s legal retirement age is 60, but many employees at private companies are pressured to leave around age 50 due to scarce executive or high-ranking jobs. When they retire at such a young age, they realize their pensions or severance packages are far below the cost of living and that the social safety net is insufficient. They are forced to re-enter the working world, but often in positions that are temporary or day-to-day, offering very low pay.

Retiree collecting cardboard boxes. Mariej55quebec. CC PDM 1.0

In order to make a living, many retirees collect anything that can be recycled and transported to the local junk yard using makeshift handcarts. Cardboard boxes are what they tend to collect most because they are the easiest to come across. Although prices vary, the average income per kilogram (2.2 lbs.) is 40 won ($0.33). On a 12 hour day, retirees earn about $6.68: a salary that’s far below the poverty line. South Korea is expected to become a “super-aged society” with more than 20% of its population aged 65 years and older by 2026. A fall in the fertility rate and rising longevity are the two fundamental contributors to the country’s growing ageing population. 

Pre-pandemic, soup kitchens were a social gathering place for many retirees. A popular one among the elderly was Angel Soup Kitchen. On average, they served more than 350 free meals three times a week: operating 26 centers across South Korea. Retirees would line up in the early hours of the day to guarantee a spot in line. It was a place where they could be among other seniors enjoying a meal. However, with the pandemic and the elderly being the most vulnerable, Angel Soup Kitchen closed and now distributes take home meals. With so many soup kitchens closing, Warm Chaeumteo was one of the few that remained open. They provide three meals a day, seven days a week. Due to the temporary closure of other soup kitchens, the center is getting approximately 100 more visitors a day, compared with the normal turnout before the outbreak. They receive just under 1,000 people per day. It is becoming harder to keep soup kitchens open with the decline in volunteers, many deciding they want to avoid face to face interactions.

Senior Koreans Playing Chess at a Park. Terence. CC BY-ND 2.0

The mental health of retirees has seen a spike in recent years. The disruption of the traditional family unit is a large reason why. Children often lose contact with their parents, leaving the retired elderly to feel lonely and isolated. A long term effect of these feelings will trigger depression, anxiety and loneliness. To socialize, retirees frequent parks and public areas, but with the restrictions of the pandemic, most areas are now closed. This forces the elderly into further isolation and a toll on their mental health. Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service reported that about 40% of the 684,000 Koreans diagnosed with severe depression were over age 60. With an aging population that will only continue to grow, countries with large elderly populations are facing an unprecedented issue: how to properly care for a large influx of elderly people, while still moving towards the future. Living longer is usually associated as being a hallmark of success, but current societal structures in many countries are not equipped to provide the social services needed. 

As South Korea and the globe try to figure out how to care for this large wave of retirees living longer, there are startups like EverYoung. A company that only hires employees aged 55 and older. Employees monitor blog content and detect sensitive information, as well as perform other IT tasks. There are 420 seniors from a variety of career backgrounds employed. Moreover, a mandated 10-minute break for every 50 minutes of work, and staff are rostered on four-hour shifts. Manager Kim Seong-Kyu told ChannelNews Asia that older employees have detail-oriented skills not common in the younger workforce, with distracting cell phones stored away during work time. Kyu said, “they are full of passion. The time that they have, and their interest in this work, are primarily why they come to work”.

To Get Involved:

The Korea Legacy Committee and Asian Boss have partnered to provide free meals every Sunday for the South Korean elderly. They aim to become a safe haven for impoverished seniors and expand the meal program around the country.  

To learn more about Korea Legacy Comittee click here.

To support the South Korean elderly during the pandemic click here.

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Jennifer Sung

Jennifer is a Communications Studies graduate based in Los Angeles. She grew up traveling with her dad and that is where her love for travel stems from. You can find her serving the community at her church, Fearless LA or planning her next trip overseas. She hopes to be involved in international humanitarian work one day.

Ethiopian Migrant Workers Left More Vulnerable After Devastating Explosion in Beirut

On Aug. 4, two massive explosions in Beirut, the capital of Lebanon, sent a shock wave that destroyed many neighborhoods, killed more than 200 people, injured 6,000 and left approximately 250,000 homeless. The tragedy struck a country that is already suffering from a major economic crisis, an increase in COVID-19 cases, and the corruption and negligence of the Lebanese government—corruption which led to the deadly explosion. Reports emerged that the government knew about the over 3,000 tons of ammonium nitrate, which is used to build bombs, and left it unattended and unsecured for six years.

As the Lebanese people’s anger boiled over, protests calling for an end to the political elite erupted, leading to the resignation of the majority of the Lebanese government. According to The Wall Street Journal, on Aug. 10 Prime Minister Hassan Diab addressed the nation in a televised address: “I set out to combat corruption, but I discovered that corruption is bigger than the state. I declare today the resignation of this government. God bless Lebanon.”

But according to Foreign Policy, “the public is unlikely to be appeased by the resignation of Diab’s government” as “the rest of the country’s political elites, the sectarian warlords of the civil war era and their descendants, clinging to positions of privilege, are still busy looking for scapegoats.” As the public continues to fight for the fall of the regime, it is hoped that not only will the Lebanese benefit, but so too will the migrant workers whose plight worsens as crises continue to befall the country.

According to The New Arab, “around 250,000 migrants work as housekeepers, nannies and carers in Lebanese homes.” Most of the workers are women, many of whom immigrated from Ethiopia and the Philippines, according to The Associated Press. The migrant workers do not have labor law protections as they were brought in through the kafala system, an exploitative and abusive sponsorship system used in Bahrain, Kuwait, Lebanon, Qatar, Oman, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. The migrant workers are vulnerable to exploitation as the countries that practice the kafala system offer little to no protection for migrant workers—their right to work and legal presence is entirely dependent on their employer. The migration sponsorship system “increases their risk of suffering labor exploitation, forced labor and trafficking, and leaves them with little prospect of obtaining redress,” according to Amnesty International.

The ongoing economic crisis in Lebanon, along with the spike in COVID-19 cases, has made an already dire situation worse for migrant workers. According to Amnesty International, “many have reported that the value of their salaries has decreased by around a third because of the currency crash.” Their salaries were already as little as $150 per month before the severe economic crisis and pandemic, according to France 24. In June, BBC reported that more than 100 Ethiopian migrant domestic workers were fired and left homeless outside their country’s consulate in Beirut after their employers claimed they could no longer afford to pay their maids.

Now, the explosions have left the domestic workers even more vulnerable. CNN reported, “In the aftermath, rights groups are warning that this vulnerable group is facing dire situations as many of them are stranded in the country and unable to go home.” Activists like Farah Salka of Lebanon’s Anti-Racism Movement are fighting for the migrant workers’ rights. Salka told CNN, “They are running from one escalating situation to the other and it is an endless stream of trauma. They have faced COVID, economic crisis, airport closure, quarantine restrictions in often hostile conditions and they want to go home.”

Finding a way home is proving difficult for the Ethiopian migrants. According to Middle East Eye, “Ethiopia has tripled the price of repatriation for its citizens in Lebanon to $1,450, including flights and mandatory quarantine, further prohibiting the return of dozens of women stranded and destitute outside its Beirut consulate.” This is approximately a $900 increase from a May 21 article from Quartz Africa which reported, “Ethiopia’s consulate had collected $550 registration fees for the repatriation flights.”

People on social media are calling for better treatment of migrant workers in Lebanon after footage showed an Ethiopian migrant worker saving a young child from shattered glass as the second explosion erupted in the capital. Lebanese journalist Luna Safwan tweeted, “Migrant worker grabs toddler and saves her from shattered glass and windows as the second big explosion erupted in Beirut earlier today. She did not even think. Migrant workers deserve better in #Lebanon – this woman is a hero.”

Asiya Haouchine

is an Algerian-American writer who graduated from the University of Connecticut in May 2016, earning a BA in journalism and English. She was an editorial intern and contributing writer for Warscapes magazine and the online/blog editor for Long River Review. She is currently studying for her Master’s in Library and Information Science. @AsiyaHaou

Why Coronavirus Is Humanity’s Wake-Up Call

The rapid spread of novel coronavirus has prompted government, business, and civil society to take dramatic action—canceling events large and small, restricting travel, and shutting down major segments of the economy on which nearly all of us depend. It is a demonstration of our ability, when the imperative is clear, for deep and rapid global cooperation and change at a previously unimaginable speed and scale.

There is an obvious desire to protect ourselves and our loved ones. But we are also seeing something more as communities mobilize to address the crisis—a sense of mutual responsibility, born of a recognition that we are ultimately bound to a common fate. The speed of the resulting global shift is beyond any prior human experience.

At the same time, the crisis of the coronavirus pandemic focuses attention in the United States on the disastrous deficiencies of a profiteering health care system. Corporations are competing only to increase their take from health expenditures while minimizing the amount of money they spend on providing care. This system is reasonably proficient in providing boutique care for the very rich at exorbitant prices, but it is disastrously deficient in addressing the health care needs of ordinary people affordably. It is similarly deficient in anticipating, preparing for, and responding to public health emergencies such as the one we are in now.  

I sense that as our eyes open to this reality, we are seeing a simultaneous awakening to the imperative to deal with a host of other system failures that imperil our common future. For example:

• An economic system that values nature only for its market price, ignores Earth’s limits, and wantonly destroys the stability of its climate and the health and purity of its air, water, and soil. This directly imperils our survival and well-being.

• Military expenditures that consume more than half of all federal discretionary funding to prepare for conventional wars of the past and engage us in unwinnable conflicts born of environmental and social collapse. This represents wasted resources that would be better applied to addressing the underlying sources of current security threats.

• A financial system devoted to generating speculative profits for the richest without the burden of contributing to meaningful livelihoods and security for those who do useful work. Money must serve us, not enslave us.

•An education system that promotes maximizing personal financial returns as the highest moral obligation to society. Education should prepare us to transform a self-destructive system into one that will support our long-term future.

For far too long, we have ignored the failures of a system that reduces ever more people to homelessness, incarceration, refugee camps, permanent indebtedness, and servitude to institutions devoted to conflict and the generation of unearned financial returns. The challenges are monumental and are likely to be addressed only as we begin to understand that business as usual is simply not an option.

We need leaders committed to effective government of, by, and for the people.

This is humanity’s wake-up call. As we awaken to the truth of the profound failure of our existing institutions, we also awaken to the truth of our possibilities and interconnections with one another and with Earth. With that awakening comes a recognition that we must now learn to live lightly on the Earth, to war no more, and to dedicate ourselves to the well-being of all in an interdependent world.

We in the United States also face a special challenge. We have much that the world admires. But far from being a model for others to emulate, we represent an extreme example of what the world must now leave behind.

As a nation, we have for too long battled over simplistic political ideologies that limit our choices to granting ultimate power either to government or corporations, both of which are controlled by the richest among us. The coronavirus pandemic is a powerful reminder that effective government committed to the common good is essential to our well-being, and that there is no place in our common future for politicians committed to proving that government cannot work.

We need leaders committed to effective government of, by, and for the people. These leaders must simultaneously recognize that the collective well-being of all depends on institutions in all three sectors—government, business, and civil society—that are effective at, committed to, and accountable for serving the well-being of the communities that create them.

These are challenging and frightening times. As we respond to the coronavirus emergency and the immediate needs of the people and communities impacted by it, let us also keep in view the systemic needs and possibilities that crisis exposes. Despite the trauma all around us, let us embrace this moment as an opportunity to move forward to create a better world for all.

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David Korten is co-founder of YES! Media, president of the Living Economies Forum, a member of the Club of Rome, and the author of influential books, including “When Corporations Rule the World” and “Change the Story, Change the Future: A Living Economy for a Living Earth.” His work builds on lessons from the 21 years he and his wife, Fran, lived and worked in Africa, Asia, and Latin America on a quest to end global poverty.

THIS ARTICLE WAS ORGINALLY PUBLISHED ON YES!

BANGLADESH: From No-Man's Land to the Unknown

For decades, more than 50,000 people have been stranded, without access to basic rights, on tiny islands of no-man's land locked within India and Bangladesh. Last year finally saw an end to these enclaves, or 'chitmahals,' bringing hope and change to communities living on the world's most complex border. 

The party lasted long into the night across remote patches of northern Bangladesh. As the clock struck midnight people played music, danced and sang using candles for light, and for the first time in their villages they raised a national flag. Similar events were also taking place on the other side of the border in India just a stone’s throw away. 

For 68 years, ever since the formation of East Pakistan in 1947 (which later became known as Bangladesh), the residents of one of the world’s greatest geographical border oddities have been waiting for this moment; for their chance to finally become part of the country that has surrounded yet eluded them for so many years.

At 12.01am on July 31st, 2015, India and Bangladesh finally exchanged 162 tracts of land — 111 inside Bangladesh and 51 inside India. 

Known in geographical terms as enclaves, or locally as chitmahals, these areas can most easily be described as sovereign pieces of land completely surrounded by another, entirely different, sovereign nation.

ABOVE: Inside an enclave, a man prepares jute by removing the long, soft vegetable fibres that can be spun into coarse, strong threads, and keeping the sticks. For many enclave dwellers, jute is where most of their income comes from and also what they use to build their houses. 

Enclaves aren’t as rare as you may think, and until now this part of South Asia has contained the vast majority. Existing around the world, mostly in Europe and the former Soviet Union, they were once much more prevalent — until modern day cartography and accurately defined borders eliminated many. Some still remain, such as the Belgium town of Baarle-Hertog, which is full of Dutch territory. The locals have turned the unusual border into a tourist attraction. However, for this region of southern Asia, where political and religious tensions run high, the existence of enclaves is not so jovial. Life for those who are from these areas is far harder than in neighboring villages, only minutes away.

ABOVE: Sisters Lobar Rani Bormoni, 11, and Shapla Rani Bormoni, 12, stand in a paddy field in the enclave in Bangladesh where they born. 

“These enclaves are officially recognised by each state, but remain un-administered because of their discontinuous geography. Enclave residents are often described as “stateless” in that they live in zones outside of official administration — since officials of one country cannot cross a sovereign frontier into administered territory,” explains Jason Cons, a Research Assistant Professor at the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas, Austin and author of the forthcoming book, ‘Sensitive Space: Fragmented Territory at the India-Bangladesh Border.’

ABOVE: Muslim men from Dhoholakhagrabari enclave pray in their mosque. Mosques are usually the only solid structures that exist inside the enclaves.

Several folktales tell of the origin of these enclaves being the stakes in a game of chess between two feuding maharajas in the 18th century, or even the result of a drunken British officer who spilt spots of ink on the map he drew during partition in 1947. Captivating as these stories are, the most likely explanation dates back to 1711 when a peace treaty was signed between the feuding Maharajah of Coch Behar and the Mughal Emperor in Delhi. After the treaty their respective armies retained and controlled areas of land, where the local people had to pay tax to the respective ruler, thus creating pockets of land controlled by different people.

Prior to 1947, when this region was entirely Indian territory, living in these locally-controlled enclaves made little difference. However, during the drawing of the boundary between India and Bangladesh, the Maharajah of Coch Behar asked to join India — on the condition that he retain all his land, including that inside the newly formed East Pakistan, which his ancestors had rightly won control of over 200 years ago.

So, through no fault of their own, the lives of 50,000 people turned upside down — for decades they have been stranded on islands of no-man’s land.

ABOVE: (Left) A man fishes at dusk using his large bamboo fish trap. This river exists just outside the enclave but as it’s in Bangladesh territory, enclave dwellers are forbidden to fish here otherwise angering the local fishermen. (Right) Enclave dwellers fish in a flooded paddy. 

During the early 1970s a framework to find a solution to this problem was put in place — called the 1974 Land Boundary Agreement. For forty years, as governments came and went, neither the Indian nor the Bangladeshi politicians were able to agree with their counterparts at the time. And whilst the politicians squabbled, the residents suffered.

ABOVE: Only informal work, like at this sawmill, is available for enclave dwellers in Bangladesh. 

On the ground there are no border fences or security checkpoints, and without realising it, you can walk in and out of India countless times, crossing an international boundary completely obliviously. However, there is a serious lack of infrastructure and this has been one of the most serious problems facing the residents. Paved roads quite literally stop at the boundaries to the chitmahals, as do electricity poles. The enclave inhabitants in Debiganj District of Bangladesh, as non-Bangladeshi citizens, were even barred from sending their children to school, also receiving no state assistance or even the most basic of hospital treatment.

ABOVE: Sheltered within their small bamboo house, located inside the enclave of Dhoholakhagrabari, Eity Rani, 14, and Shobo Rai, 8, carefully do their homework by the light of an oil lamp. Life is much harder for children who are born in enclaves.

ABOVE: (Right) A Bangladeshi man sits in a shop in the market of a small town that sits between enclaves. (Left) Every Saturday a jute market is held in Debiganj. For the many inhabitants of the enclaves that surround the town, jute is where most of their income comes from. 

Wearing just a lungi — a traditional sarong worn around the waist — Sri Ajit Memo is sitting in the middle of a small muddy courtyard, surrounded by houses made of bamboo and jute sticks. At 55 years old, his family have lived in a Dhoholakhagrabari chitmahal for generations. Chewing on the twig of a certain tree that locals here use as an alternative to toothpaste, he explains, “All kinds of problems exist here. The government doesn’t care about us, or our children, and so it’s very difficult for them to even go to school. Honestly, we are Indian, but how can we feel this way when we get no help from them?”

For enclave dwellers on both sides of the Indian-Bangladeshi border, the entitlement to receive even the most basic of rights has eluded them.

Reece Jones, an Associate Professor in Political Geography at the University of Hawai’i Manoa, who has visited many chitmahals on both sides of the border, explains further, “After decades in this situation many people have found ways around it through bribes to officials or through friends who helped them to obtain the documents they needed, such as school enrolment forms for their children. However, the situation was not stable or secure. They were extremely vulnerable to theft and violence because the police had no jurisdiction in the enclaves.”

ABOVE: Rupsana Begum, 7, (pink dress) and Monalisa Akter, 7, (orange dress) are from an enclave but were able to come and study at Sher-e-Bangla Government School because their parents managed to acquire fake documents and were able to pay the school.

ABOVE: In Dhoholakhagrabari enclave students and their teacher sit in a madrassa class. Because enclave children have a difficult time accessing the education system in Bangladesh the locals of this enclave formed an Islamic Foundation funded on donations.

Today, after decades left living in limbo in these randomly placed no-man’s lands, around 47,000 people on the Bangladeshi side and some 14,000 on the Indian side have finally been given the right make a choice: stay where they have lived for generations with official citizenship of the country that will absorb them, or return to their country of origin.

None of the residents living in Bangladeshi enclaves within India asked to return to Bangladesh and as a result they will now all become Indian citizens. However, on the other side of the border in Bangladesh, whilst the vast majority of the Indian enclave dwellers decided to stay and become Bangladeshi citizens, 979 people requested to return to India. For these families, the enclave saga has yet to end.

Of those 979 individuals, a total of 406 come from Debiganj district. In 2011, a team of Indian officials visited every home in every enclave in Bangladesh and produced the first ever detailed census of all those living within the Indian enclaves. This report formed the basis of all subsequent decisions on the status of each person living in the enclaves.

ABOVE: (Left) An old lady inside her home, which has no running water or electricity, in Dayuti enclave. (Right) Dhonobala Rani, 70, gets emotional knowing that she has to leave her son (in the blue shirt) behind in Bangladesh, as she takes Indian citizenship. 

Several months after my visit to document the enclaves during the final days of their existence, those who had chosen to leave for India finally crossed the border, leaving their homes in Bangladesh forever. In India they were given land and began the process of integrating into Indian society. Those who chose to stay behind in Bangladesh also started to receive such basic rights as eligibility to vote and access to health care.

Let us hope that after decades of struggle on these isolated political islands, the lives of these ex-enclaves dwellers can begin to reach some level of normalcy. In the end, after so many years of uncertainty, the world’s strangest border region has now become a thing of the past.

ABOVE: A lady from Ponchoki Bhajini village, in the enclave of Dhoholakhagrabari. She has chosen to leave for India, to start a new life as an Indian citizen.

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON MAPTIA 

LUKE DUGGLEBY

@LukeDuggleby

Luke Duggleby is a British freelance documentarian and travel photographer. He currently lives in Bangkok and is represented by Redux Pictures. 

KICKING IT: Homeless World Cup

Can soccer solve homelessness? The Homeless World Cup thinks it can certainly help and through encouraging participation in this annual event, held since 2003,  that it will encourage participants to change their own lives and solve global homelessness affecting 100 million people worldwide. This is a trailer for the feature length documentary, Kicking It, that chronicles the lives of seven players taking a once in a lifetime opportunity to represent their country at the 2006 Capetown, South Africa event. 64 countries will participate in the 2013 event in Poznan, Poland.

CONNECT WITH HOMELESS WORLD CUP