●Xia Rongqiang
One of the outstanding signs of building a moderately prosperous society in an all-round way is the significant increase in the average standard of living of the people of all ethnic groups in the country (it is generally believed that the per capita annual income should reach 3,000 U.S. dollars). This is a daunting task for the disabled, who account for nearly one-twentieth of the country's population. In the face of this ambitious goal and this difficult but promising road, what should the disabled masses do? Should they be passive and do nothing, or should they pull themselves together and work hard? I think we should not hesitate to choose the latter, to speed up the pace of follow-up, not to drag the country to build a moderately prosperous society.
There are 8.77 million blind compatriots in China, the vast majority of whom live in rural areas. Since the reform and opening up, with the significant development of the cause of the disabled and blind massage in China, blind massage has become the main channel of employment for the blind in cities and towns, and batches and batches of blind medical massage workers and blind health care massage workers have been trained in various places. To date, there are more than 20,000 blind massage practitioners engaged in medical services, and more than 40,000 blind people engaged in health care massage services. "After the Tenth Plan, the total number of these two categories of blind massage workers is expected to exceed 100,000 people. Engaging in medical or health care massage is indeed one of the best channels of employment for the blind.
In recent years, the vast majority of blind people practicing tui na medical and health care massage services have undergone fundamental changes in their economic situation and quality of life, impressing other categories of disabled groups. According to incomplete statistics, it is common for a blind massage worker to earn about one thousand dollars a month; and it is also common for those with good skills, or blind massage practitioners who are engaged in massage and massage services in big cities and Guangdong and Shenzhen to earn more than two thousand five hundred dollars or three thousand dollars a month. These leading blind people have taken the lead in meeting the living and income standards of a well-off society.
Despite the fact that blind massage work has brought a bright side to the employment of the blind, it is, after all, a very small fraction of the total number of blind people in the country. There are still a large number of blind people, especially in the rural areas, who are still under great pressure and encountering all kinds of problems in employment. How can we fully mobilize the enthusiasm and motivation of blind people of all cultural levels, physical conditions, and living in different regions, and how can we effectively tap the strengths and potentials of blind people of all kinds to meet the employment needs of the blind people? I personally believe that we can analyze and explore the question of how to further broaden the employment channels for the blind in the future according to the needs of each individual and location.
First of all, I would like to talk about the first level of employment for the blind, that is, knowledge-based employment:
After massage and tui-na for the blind, there has been another form of employment with great potential for development in recent years, which has entered the ranks of knowledge-based employment for the blind, that is, piano tuning for the blind. As a matter of fact, piano tuning itself has a long history as a form of employment for the blind. In Fuzhou City, Fujian Province, as early as the 1930s, a blind man named Liu Tianchuan was sent to England by the Church of England's School for the Blind to learn piano tuning and piano repair techniques. After returning to China, he brought out several blind piano tuners in Fuzhou. Mr. Liu Tianchuan brought out several blind piano tuners in Fuzhou, such as Li Bolin, Chen Zhongliang and Liu Tao. These blind piano tuning lawyers in the middle of the last century and the 1960s and 1970s in Fuzhou piano tuning market enjoys a good reputation, even those who are blind tuning lawyers in the business and the level of these blind people compared to the feeling of inferior.
Later, the blind engaged in piano tuning this job market is indeed some shrinkage, this aspect of the blind practitioners are less and less. At the end of the last century, under the active advocacy and organization of Mr. Li Renwei of the Beijing School for the Blind, and with the enthusiastic support and assistance of the leadership of the Beijing School for the Blind and all the parties concerned, a college class on piano tuning for the blind was declared to be established. Over the past few years, the piano tuning class of the Beijing School for the Blind has produced 100 percent of the blind tuners who are employed, and the demand even exceeds the supply for many employers. Some of the blind tuning lawyers have just been working for a few years, and because of their excellent work and superb skills, they have obtained middle and senior titles in piano tuning. With the deepening of reform and opening up, more and more pianos are entering the homes of ordinary people as their living standards improve. We can expect that the future piano tuning market for the blind will be full of vitality.
In addition to the two more familiar and highly maneuverable channels of employment for the blind, there are three more examples of successful careers for the blind. These three types of knowledge and skill-based careers are certainly not within the reach of most blind people, but it would be helpful to talk about them in order to increase the self-confidence of the blind and to understand their own potential.
One of these is computer software development. This career requires a high level of personal intelligence and, of course, a solid knowledge base. There are several typical blind people who have succeeded in this field: Zhu Shuangliu from Shanghai, who first designed and developed the Braille input method software, so that the blind people can directly use the Braille dot input method to input Chinese characters on computers; Wang Yongde from Guangdong, who started to contact with computers in April, 1997, and then developed a blind DOS system database in October, and then successfully designed and developed the "Computer Windows System" in the end of 1999 At the end of 1999, he successfully designed and developed the "Yongde screen reading voice software" for Windows system, which opened up a barrier-free way for the blind to apply computers for database operation, editing articles, sending and receiving e-mails and browsing on the Internet; Wang Zhiyuan from Hunan Province successfully designed and developed another database operating system for the blind and a set of massage management software for the blind through computer research; Wang Zhiyuan from Anhui Province successfully designed and developed another database operating system for the blind and a set of massage management software for the blind. Wang Zhiyuan from Hunan Province, through computer research, successfully designed and developed another database operating system for the blind and a set of massage management software for the blind; Wang Shilong from Anhui Province, who lost his sight halfway through the year, was undaunted and carefully researched Chinese character computer input technology, and succeeded in developing the "Fangyuan categorized hieroglyphic code (Dragon Horse Chinese character input technology)", which has been awarded a national patent. We believe that people in this field will continue to stand out in the future and become a bright landscape of knowledge and skill-based employment for the blind.
The other type is Chinese and English translation. In recent years, a number of highly qualified blind persons have participated in the free English correspondence courses of the American Hedley School for the Blind, Fuzhou, China. A considerable number of these blind students have greatly improved their English cultural quality and level through English study, and have begun to show their talents in English translation. Some of them translate scientific and technical information from foreign magazines into Chinese and publish it in domestic newspapers and magazines, thus earning remuneration. Of course, there is still a big gap between this and becoming a stable income and family-supporting profession. Recently, Chen Xiajiong, a Shanghai student at the school, has found a new way to get a job by utilizing his knowledge of English, which is indeed a new inspiration for people. A few months ago, Chen Xiajiong learned from the Internet that a translation company in Shanghai wanted to recruit text translators, so he boldly contacted him via E-mail to apply for the job. Through the trial translation of several English letters, the employer was very satisfied, and immediately decided to hire Chen Xiajiong as the company's translator. Chen Xiajiong only needs to work at home every day, receive Chinese and English letters sent by the company through the network, and then translate them and send them back to the company through E-mail. This home-based work allows Chen to earn a steady income of 1,200 dollars a month. Can this not also set a better example for other blind people with this kind of expertise and conditions in terms of knowledge and skill-based employment?
There is another kind of school or class. The running of schools and classes here refers to the running of schools by the social forces, which belongs to the category of private education. The conditions of this knowledge and skill-based employment or entrepreneurship depend, in large part, on the strong level of professional knowledge and personal entrepreneurial boldness that the blind themselves possess. I would like to cite two specific examples of students of Haideri School for the Blind Fuzhou Branch who have succeeded in applying for running schools and classes in English:
One of them is Gao Lu from Dunhua, Jilin. He was one of the earliest students of the Hedley School for the Blind, Fuzhou, China. In 1989, he began to use his English knowledge to teach English tuition to the blind and primary school students in his neighborhood, which had already achieved good social and economic benefits. After years of practice, summed up a lot of teaching and organization of teaching experience, Gao Lu finally succeeded in embarking on the road of a formal school, in 2000, he founded the "Chunhua English School", was officially issued by the Dunhua Municipal Board of Education to run the school license. At present, the high road of Chunhua English School has opened more than a dozen classes, English remedial level, including elementary school, junior high school and high school, in the students **** up to more than seven hundred people. Gao Lu not only purchased the school building, but also added all the teaching equipment needed in the teaching process. Isn't his entrepreneurial success worth learning from?
Another success in running schools and classes is Huang Xixiang of Gaizhou, Liaoning. He also had a good academic record at the Haideri School for the Blind in Fuzhou, China, and in 2001 he applied to set up an English language course for blind and primary school students in the area. This English tutoring organization, called "Future English Course", now has more than 80 English tutors for primary and secondary school students. Huang Xixiang also gained both social and economic benefits.
The above mentioned categories of knowledge and skill-based employment channels for the blind, some of which have developed quite well, and some of which are in the process of further improvement and gradual expansion. In fact, there are many more knowledge-based jobs available to the blind. In the case of writing, there are a number of blind people who are quite capable of writing. Some of them regularly publish poems and essays in newspapers and magazines; some are quite successful in writing novels. However, whether the blind can turn writing into a profession with stable income, and how to realize this goal in concrete terms, need to be explored more and more research on feasible solutions.
There is another intriguing success story of a blind person engaging in motor repair. Anhui has one such blind person, in this regard has written its own legendary experience. The blind man has been interested in fiddling with motors since he was a child, and often learns about motor repair from his brother. Once, he repaired a broken pump motor in the eyes of skeptics and became famous. Later, the blind man opened a motor repair service department, which was quite prosperous and famous. Motor repair has literally become a permanent profession of knowledge and skill for the blind man. From this example, is it not possible to further inspire us: there is nothing we can't think of, nothing we can't do, and the same applies to the blind. It seems that the potential for broadening the employment of the blind is not small.
At the level of knowledge-based employment for the blind, I would like to conclude by raising two more points for discussion:
The first point is: Can the blind become legal advisors and psychological counselors? Theoretically and logically, this is not a problem. Many blind people are characterized by natural intelligence and have very impressive memories. If there are conditions for these blind people to study and further their professional knowledge in law or psychology, why can they not become experts in this field? I think that if, on the one hand, our universities can create conditions for the admission of blind people who have chosen to specialize in this field, or if the Self-Study Examination for Higher Education can open up a green channel for the blind, and if, on the other hand, the legal departments and psychological counseling agencies can update their concepts and absorb these qualified specialists to practise in this field, then it will be possible to cultivate, as some developed countries have done, our own blind legal practitioners and psychological counseling workers. This will make it possible for us to train our own blind legal practitioners and psychological counselors, just like some developed countries. Because the main key to the success of these two kinds of work lies in the human brain and IQ (and human memory, comprehension, logical thinking ability and the ability to judge right and wrong, etc.), and many blind people are gifted in this respect.
The second point is: Can the rural blind engage in mushroom cultivation? Mushrooms and other edible fungi are tasty, have high nutritional value, and can prevent and fight cancer, making them a favorite table food for most people. Since rural areas have more space than urban areas, it is easier to solve the problem of space for cultivation of edible mushrooms. On the other hand, mushroom cultivation is a static operation, unlike raising chickens and ducks that run around, it is dynamic and not easy for the blind to control. Therefore, if the blind people in rural areas can learn and master the cultivation technology of edible fungus and can form a smooth sales channel, then edible fungus cultivation may be a better channel for the blind people in rural areas to get rid of poverty. Personally, I think that if this is a path to be considered and tried in the future, preparations must be made in the following three aspects: firstly, the Disabled Persons' Federation should be the organizer of this employment, and it must designate a person to be in charge of this project, invite professionals to conduct classes and demonstrations on the ground; secondly, it should put forward a part of the funds from the Employment Guarantee Fund of the Disabled Persons to buy fungus for the blind (or to give loans to them to buy fungus), and organize and guide the production. ), and organizing and guiding the production; thirdly, contacting the purchase and sales market, and providing good logistic services for the blind.
It should also be noted that the feasibility and success rate of this knowledge and skill-based employment would be higher if the blind were assisted by sighted persons in their homes in the implementation of the process of cultivation from mushroom seeds to mushroom seedlings.
Next, I would like to turn to the second level of broadening employment avenues for the blind, namely, manual skilled employment. This type of employment does not require a high level of literacy, nor does it require specialized theoretical knowledge, and it is mainly through manual labor and skilled production operations. Therefore, it is more suitable for the blind in rural areas.
In the past, when most people talked about the employment of the blind, they often talked about the urban blind, and seldom touched on the employment needs of the rural blind, who accounted for a larger proportion of the total number of blind people. If we want to change the low employment rate of the blind in China, and if we want to focus on the overall situation so that the blind can keep pace with the building of a moderately affluent society, we should focus on the employment of the rural blind, who account for the vast majority of the total blind population in the country. The characteristics of this group of blind people are that they are large in number, have a relatively low level of education, are less able to participate in social interaction, and prefer to remain stable rather than move around. However, it is undeniable that the vast majority of this group of blind people have normal IQs and are capable of learning and accepting new things. As long as this group of blind people can be trained in a planned and organized way, their practical skills can be brought into full play. In view of these characteristics, I would like to share my views and ideas at this level of employment of the manually skilled blind.
To begin with the question of the feasibility of knitting and object preparation as an employment for the blind. The ability of the blind to knit with their hands is evident and proven. You must have heard of instances of blind people knitting sweaters, and some blind people can knit different colors on their sweaters. In the 1960s, the blind in Fuzhou organized the production of bamboo products, such as hot-water bottle shells, bamboo mats, bamboo baskets, bamboo curtains and soil skips for picking soil. They were not only able to carry out the preparation of finished products, but also to crack raw materials like moso bamboo into bamboo strips, pieces and gimlets. All these examples show that blind people are capable of doing some kind of weaving work.
Of course, times have changed, and the social environment and social needs have changed a lot. But I think that if one wants to do it, one can still find points of supply and demand that are needed in today's society. For example, one can prepare fruit baskets, bird cages, chicken and duck cages, as well as bamboo mats, pillow mats, chair mats and bowl mats. There is a market demand for these items today and in the future as well. Of course, as to what kind of weaving or compiling items to engage in, whether it is bamboo, willow, rattan or grass weaving, etc., it should be considered according to the resources and market supply and demand of each place and according to local conditions.
The key to expanding employment for the rural blind is to be practical and not to be greedy or over-ambitious. Here are some more easy to make projects. First two analogies: today's modern warfare weapons development has entered the digital, electronic information technology and precision guidance stage, but the ultimate solution to the battle is still to rely on two-legged infantry. Modern society is developing by leaps and bounds, and high-tech products abound, but if you eat with your teeth jammed, you still have to rely on a small toothpick to solve the problem.
So why can't the blind in rural areas be organized to make little things like bamboo chopsticks, toothpicks, and sewing needles that are essential to their daily lives?
On the subject of skilled manual employment for the rural blind, I would like to conclude with one more point. Many people like to eat bean sprouts, and they are among the better-selling vegetables in the market because of their higher nutritional value and better taste. So can we consider the possibility of the rural blind developing the industry of producing bean sprouts through training? The production of bean sprouts is much simpler and less costly than the cultivation of edible mushrooms which I have talked about in the Knowledge and Skills Employment section. As long as the blind can purchase good quality soybeans and mung beans, go through training and guidance on the operation, and master the temperature and humidity for the growth of bean sprouts, I believe that they will soon be able to get the hang of it and make a better profit. I personally think that bean sprout production is a good employment option for the rural areas and even for some blind people in the cities who are not suitable for massage work or other knowledge and skill-based jobs. It is not only easy to grasp the operation skills and the production space does not occupy much space, but also has low input cost, short production cycle and quick returns. Isn't it worthwhile for everyone to give it a try?
In summary, I think that for the blind compatriots in rural areas who are less educated and poorer in life, it is not that they can only sit at home and do nothing all day long, at the mercy of fate and poverty, but that there are opportunities waiting to be grasped by everyone, and there are paths waiting to be opened up by everyone. There are opportunities to be seized and paths to be explored. We should all pull ourselves together and bravely challenge life. At the same time, we should also quietly do some thinking, make an objective analysis of their own situation and local conditions, establish confidence and courage to overcome the difficulties, and ultimately identify a manual skilled employment path for themselves, and bravely try. Comrade Deng Xiaoping taught us when he inspected Shenzhen and delivered his Southern Tour speech that we should have the spirit of daring to think, dare to break through, dare to do, and not be afraid of failure or setbacks. This was said to the whole Party and the people of the country, and also to our compatriots with disabilities.
Another very important key point, which is related to whether the manual skilled employment of the rural blind can be put into practice, and whether they can really get rid of difficulties and poverty, lies in the following: to strengthen the work and construction of the grass-roots federations of the disabled, and to equip disabled workers who are enthusiastic about the cause of the disabled and are willing to work for the cause of the disabled, so that they can carry out the specific organization of the employment projects of the blind, training, market research, as well as to do a good job of the raw material purchase and a series of auxiliary work of the product sales. A series of auxiliary work for the purchase of raw materials and the sale of products. We believe that the success of anything lies in the people. If there are people who are enthusiastic about the cause, who actively support it, who organize it, and who are passionate about it, why should we worry about the cause?
(The author is the chairman of Fujian Province Association for the Blind, and the principal of American Hedley School for the Blind, Fuzhou Branch)