HARD FOR TEA GARDENS TO FIND YOUNG LABORS|高山茶園缺工 日薪3千仍難吸引年輕人

This tragic incident also revealed a serious issue in Taiwan's tea industry. For years, young people have not been willing to work at tea farms, despite a daily wage of around NT$3,000, leaving people in their 50s and 60s or migrant workers to take on the physically tasking job. Here's our in-depth report. It's getting to the end of winter tea leaves picking season. However, the labors are either old people or new migrant workers. Hardly can you see young people work at farms. When it comes to the harvest season, labors are always hard to find. ==HUANG CHUNG-HAO, Lugu tea grower== The aged people are about 1/3 of the population while the other 2/3 are new migrant workers. The population outflow is a major factor. Also the aging population. Young people don't work at farms is also a big issue. Tea growers in Lugu said those old labors had been working at farms since they were young. Now they are getting old and they are just working to earn some money for living expenditures. The higher the tea leaves area is, the harder to find labors. One reason is the traveling time, the other is the road condition. Nantou County Government said the problem of labor shortage is not possible to solve in short period of time. ==CHEN JUI-CHING, Nantou County Agricultural Dept. Dir.== We worked by using the agricultural affairs service groups and recruited some unemployed labors. After they learned some basic skills of tea leaves picking, they can relieve some problems of such labor shortage. However, the number of labors is not sufficient to fulfill the demands for tea leaves picking. Although the pays for picking tea leaves are not low, but the labor shortage is getting worse. Well, they are thinking about a solution. What do you think? TRANSLATED BY：ANTHONY LIN 目前已經接近冬茶採收的尾聲，不過現在在茶園看到的採茶工，不是老人家就是新住民，少有年輕人願意做這樣的工作，每到採收期，茶區就會出現搶工潮。 ==鹿谷茶農 黃重豪== 老年人大概佔三分之一 三分之二大概都是新住民 人口外流也是一個很重要的原因 還有人口老化 年輕人不從事這個農業的工作 也是一個很大的問題 鹿谷茶農表示，年紀大的採茶工大多都是從年輕就從事這樣的工作，現在年紀大了、孩子也都外出工作，所以自己出門採茶賺點生活費，但越高山茶區就越難找到工，一方面是往返時間拉長，一方面是道路狀況，南投縣府表示，農業缺工問題，短時間無法改善。　 ==南投縣農業處長 陳瑞慶== 透過農務服務團的方式 再招募一些失業的勞工 那他學習了一些 基本的採茶技能之後 可以來做部分的調解 但是他並沒有辦法完全滿足 目前茶區需工的這種需求 雖然採茶工資並不低，但茶區長期缺工問題卻越來越嚴重，相關單位也還在思考更好的解決方法。 記者 邱植培 彭煥群 南投報導