Topic for Jan. 10, 2009 - Children from International marriages

[Connie(수경)]

By 2020, 20 pct of all children will be from international marriages

                                                                                                                                                          = the aticle from Hankyoreh newspaper =

It is being predicted that the children of immigrants settling in South Korea through international marriages will account for 20 percent of all children by 2020.

Jeong Gue-sun, director of the Association for Foreign Workers’ Human Rights in Busan, made this prediction in a presentation entitled “Human Rights of Migrant Women Workers” given at the 2008 Gyeongnam World Conference on Women’s Human Rights held November 26 at the Changwon Exhibition and Convention Center. Jeong said, “Last year, the number of foreigners living in South Korea reached over 1.066 million people, more than 2 percent of the total population, and if the current trend of increase continues, it is predicted that the percentage of foreigners will be over 5 percent in 2020.” She added, “The number of children of immigrants through marriage has been increasing at an even faster rate. They numbered 42,258 last May, but by 2020, it is predicted that they will reach 1.67 million people, making up 20 percent of all children.” It was calculated that 18,778 children from international marriages were students as of last April, but it was also found that for children of unregistered workers, currently enrolled students accounted for a mere 1,574 (16.6 percent) of the over 9,500 children of school age.

A study showed that the over 720,000 immigrant workers in South Korea made up 3 percent of all employed in the country as of late July. It also showed that they work 210.8 hours a month on average and receive average monthly pay of 1,144,000 won. Among immigrants through marriage, 52.9 percent earn less than the minimum cost of living, and 57.5 percent of women in particular were shown to belong to the absolute poverty class.

Jeong said, “There are likely many areas in need of improvement socially and institutionally to protect the human rights of immigrant women, who face double discrimination as women and foreigners, but their human rights situation can only be improved when Korean women first focus their attention on immigrant women.”

Q1)  What difficulties are the multiculturalism family children facing ?

Q2) How can this society help them ?

Q3) Is there any possibility to develop bilingual ability and do something between 2 different culture?

[Leo(DongHa)]

good~!