Status of women in Tibet rises to unprecedented level

Six women representatives from the Tibet Autonomous Region proudly announced to the world at a meeting to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing that the status of women in Tibet has risen to an unprecedented level, reports the overseas edition of People's Daily on September 1st.

Having decision-making power
Gema, chairperson of the Women's Federation of the Tibet Autonomous Region, and Pubu Zhuoma, deputy director with the health bureau of the region, are among the six representatives from Tibet, and they are both from herdsmen's families. Holding Pubu Zhuoma's hand in hers, Gema said, "We are both children from poor families. Today we have attended an international conference, something which we never dared to think of in the past. Vice-President of the Tibet Autonomous Region Cui Yuying, who was specially invited to the conference, told the reporter that in recent years the capacity of Tibetan women's participation in and discussing government and political affairs has improved as evidenced by their decision-making power in many affairs. Cui likes talking with figures: In 2004, women made up 37.99% of all the officials in Tibet. Of all the people's congress deputies and members of the Tibet Committee of CPPCC in the region, women proportions are above 20%. In addition, there are 147 women judges and 23 jurywomen in the region. "As far as I am concerned, I have worked in the financial sector for many years. Either working in government or in economic circles, I have never felt that I am despised for being a woman'', said she with a smile.

Hospital delivery rooms are full
Pubu Zhuoma has worked in a hospital for many years. As a woman, she is deeply impressed by the backwardness of the medical and health conditions for Tibetan women in the past. Due to backward thinking, pregnant women seldom went to the hospital for physical checkups or childbirth. As a result, many women died of childbirth at home. Once as a midwife, she came to know a herdswoman friend in a remote area in Tibet. The friend gave 13 births in her life. However, only six of them survived, causing the family great suffering. And she herself suffers a lot too. What makes Pubu Zhuoma cheerful is that reproductive conditions of health for Tibetan women have improved in recent years through the promotion of hospital parturition, safety reproduction, new delivery methods and child health. The death rate of pregnant women in Tibet has dropped sharply. Nowadays, the delivery rooms of the Tibet People's Hospital where Pubu Zhuoma worked are full, and additional beds are required some times. Young Tibetan people often go to the hospital for child delivery by car with their childbearing wives. With the improvement of living standards and health awareness, delivery of children in better-conditioned hospitals has become a common desire of many Tibetan couples.

Husband and wife have equal family rights
Cui Yuying told the reporter that with the increasing improvement of gender awareness in the whole Tibetan society, traditional conception of paternal power and authority of the husband has thinned with each passing day, and the traditional ethic that men are superior to women is gradually losing its power. These days, in half of urban families, husbands and wives can jointly make decisions about their families' important affairs, including their properties and offspring's schooling and job choices, while in farming and pasturing areas, the proportion reaches about 30%.

More and more husbands encourage their wives to go out to work instead of opposing their leaving for work. Gema tells the reporter an interesting story. The year before last, institutions including the Women's Federation of the autonomous region opened a women auto-driving training class and trained women truck drivers free of charge. At the beginning, women who wanted to have the training were opposed by their families. Was it too wild for women to drive trucks? Persuaded by Gema and her colleagues, the class was launched successfully. Batches of women drivers learned the art of driving and now drive on highways. People are surprised to find that autos driven by women run more stably than by men. Women drivers pay attention to hygiene and keep their autos in good condition. In addition, they do not have problems with drunken driving, as they don't care for alcohol, and they support their families with earnings. Upon hearing of the launch of a second training class, there appeared a sudden rise of people signing up for it.

Both Gema and Pubu Zhouma have sponsored various projects for giving loans to women and aided them in running small businesses, including family breeding. With increasing contributions to the family economy, women's position in the family is improving continuously with a general family requirement that both husbands and wives become home hosts.

By People's Daily Online



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