FARM WORKERS RUN AWAY IN RURAL AREAS

[Anchor Lead]

Fall is the time rural communities are in dire need of workers to harvest crops. Foreign workers are a big help for rural farmers who always suffer from a shortage in farm hands. In Gangwon-do Province, a group of foreign workers recently ran away, adding to the difficulties of farmers.

[Pkg]

Harvesting season is in full swing on a cucumber farm. Seven out of ten foreign workers assigned to the farm fled over the past three months. It caused a huge financial loss for the farm owner who provided the workers with residence facilities and self-quarantine expenses.

[Soundbite] Hong Chang-ui(Cucumber farmer) : "If we cannot pick the cucumbers on the day it's ready, we have to discard them the following day. We slept together in the same room. But I found in the morning, that many of them had run away."

Some 300 foreign workers were assigned to farms in Gangwon-do Province in the last five months. About 30 percent of them left their workposts without permission and ran away. There was a screening process. Hiring was supposed to be limited to those with farming experiences and children. But some of the hired workers lacked needed skills and knowledge about farming.

[Soundbite] (Yanggu-gun County Office official) : "There were problems with the selection of workers from the beginning. A number of workers with work experiences at factories and manufacturers were included. So they might have instigated seasonal workers in Yanggu."

The runaways are believed to have left for urban factories that offer higher wages.

[Soundbite] Choi Dae-ho(Chuncheon Immigration Office) : "If they are found, they have to pay fines and will be permanently banned from entering Korea again."

Most of them will eventually become undocumented foreigners. The Chuncheon Immigration Office are looking for the runaways through social media and relevant searches. It will also strengthen crackdowns on illegal brokers that encourage foreign workers to flee their assigned work posts.