Three gorges, a million migrants

The Yangtze river, at 3937 miles, is the third longest river in the world. One of its most distinctive features is a spectacular series of canyons known as the Three Gorges.

The Three Gorges is the site of a dam one-and-a-half miles wide and more than 600 feet high that will create a huge reservoir nearly 400 miles long. The Chinese government argues that the Three Gorges Dam project – the largest construction project in China since the Great Wall – will have many benefits.

It will tame the unruly Yangtze river, whose floods have brought destruction and death for centuries. It will enable ocean-going freighters to sail directly into the nation’s interior, boosting the export trade. And the dam’s hydropower turbines are expected to provide up to one-ninth of the nation’s electricity.

However, as well as the dramatic environmental impact, the project will force 1.2 million people to move from their homes in the rural centre of China to other regions, including three coastal cities in Zhejiang. Such a huge upheaval is bound to take its toll on the migrants, and Dr Jianmin Zhang at the Zhejiang Institute of Mental Health is looking into its impact on adolescents.

“It may be that we will find no noticeable mental health impact,” he says. “The Chinese government is doing everything possible to mitigate the effects of the resettlement.

The migrants are offered a choice of favourable destinations in economic development zones, and can visit the destination first, at the expense of the Chinese government, to decide whether they like it. They have all been given their own land to farm on the edge of the cities, and a house to live in.”

Nevertheless, some aspects of the resettlement will inevitably be stressful. “It’s over 1700 km from the middle of China to Zhejiang – far too great a distance to allow migrants to retain a connection with their place of origin. Then there’s the fact they are moving into places with a very different culture. The food is different, the language and dialect are different.”

And local customs are very different. “For example, in the Three Gorges, a bride still goes to live with her husband’s family, while in Zhejiang, a married couple may expect to have their own home. Even the crops they’ll be growing are different. And of course, on top of all that, this is involuntary migration.

At the end of the day they had to go, they had no choice. And that can make people feel disempowered.”

Acculturate?

One important question is whether it is better for migrants to keep their own customs, or to adopt those of the host community (‘acculturate’). People who use the host language within their families, eat local food and make local friends tend to have the best mental health.

In his study, Dr Zhang will compare the mental health of 700 migrant adolescents from the Three Gorges with that of 700 indigenous teenagers in Zhejiang, all aged 16–24 years. The assessment will have two parts: a self-completed questionnaire on experiences of migration, acculturation, physical/ emotional abuse, smoking and alcohol use and sexual experiences, and an interviewer-administered questionnaire.

“If we do manage to identify particular risk factors for mental health problems related to migration, we can start thinking about interventions to mitigate their impact,” says Dr Zhang. “For example, if the problem is a failure to acculturate we can think of ways to encourage them to adopt local customs as soon as possible.” Other possibilities include more preparation in schools before migration or more language training.

The findings of the research will be disseminated to groups such as policy makers, community leaders, parents and teachers, says Dr Zhang. “We want to provide national and local government departments with evidence-based information so that mental health issues can be considered in future resettlement schemes – including the remaining waves of resettlement planned for 2006–09.”

Dr Zhang is sponsored by Professor Martin Prince at the Institute of Psychiatry, who has also been funded to investigate the mental health in ageing populations in Cuba and Brazil. The questionnaires are being designed in collaboration with Dr Tawanchai Jirapramukpitak and colleagues at the Institute for Population and Social Research at Mahidol University, Thailand.