A haven for China’s snowbirds
As masses of elderly Chinese descend on the southern city of Sanya each winter, the presence of these ‘migratory birds’ from the north is putting a strain on resources in this once-remote outpost
SANYA, CHINA // Blessed with palm- fringed beaches and balmy weather, the island province of Hainan is fast becoming known as “China’s Florida” as masses of retirees flee there from the biting cold of their home towns.
“At home in Harbin, it can be minus 30°C, it’s unbearable. But here the climate is perfect,” said Wang, a 71-year-old pensioner.
Hailing from the capital of the polluted, frigid, rust-belt province of Heilongjiang on the Siberian border, Wang and her husband have migrated to the Hainan resort town of Sanya for the past eight winters.
“Here we can breathe, and that warmth is better for our health,” said Qi Ningxia, 60, an asthma sufferer from Heilongjiang who joined Wang in waving brightly coloured fans in a group exercise near the shore of the South China Sea. “And we find so many people here from our province. We are sure we will not be bored.”
Between 600,000 and 700,000 elderly Chinese descend on Sanya each winter, almost doubling its population, said Huang Cheng, a sociologist at Sanya University.
Nearly half of these “migratory birds”, as they are called, come from the north- east provinces of Heilongjiang, Jilin and Liaoning. The trend began in 2000 when residents of these provinces began buying apartments in Sanya, opening businesses and luring friends and family to join them, creating a snowball effect, Mr Huang said.
Recreational centres with pastimes aimed at the elderly, such as mahjong tables, have mushroomed. “Ping-pong, billiards, chess, calligraphy, painting or computer science” are among the offerings, said the director of one such centre.
Hainan was once a remote outpost, a place of exile for criminals and disgraced scholars, and Sanya merely a secluded, backward fishing village.
Today, the southern city is home to a Club Med resort, marinas, golf courses and luxury residential complexes as local authorities aim to attract foreign and domestic tourist dollars.
The retirees from the northeast do not fit this profile: the overwhelming majority shop in local markets rather than in shiny new malls, and prefer to play cards instead of golf.
A third of the pensioners who winter in Sanya, many of them retired steel, petroleum and mine workers, have a monthly income of between 2,000 yuan (Dh1,063) and 3,000 yuan, while a quarter receive even less, according to Mr Huang.
The influx has put pressure on local residents, who have to contend with surging food prices when the population doubles in winter. Property prices also have soared as some wealthier pen- sioners buy apartments. More than 70 per cent of apartment buyers in Hainan in 2015 did not live on the island, according to official figures.
Hospitals are also struggling to cope with an explosion in demand from elderly visitors.
“The situation has evolved so suddenly that we have to allow time for local infrastructure to adapt,” said An Honglian, director of the Yihe service centre. The Sanya- based Buddhist non- profit helps retirees with practical issues, from plumbing problems to health concerns.
Ms An said the flood of pensioners to warmer areas would only intensify as China’s population aged.
The country has more than 212 million people over age 60, who by 2030 will represent 25 per cent of the population, according to the national bureau of statistics.
Other southern provinces, such as Yunnan and Guangxi, are also experiencing an increase in elderly migrants.
Wang, the Heilongjiang pensioner, is so convinced of the benefits of her winter sojourn that she persuaded her son and grandchildren to join her in Hainan for the Lunar New Year holiday in January, overturning a Chinese tradition of spending it in one’s hometown.
“Here there is bracing sea air. It’s good for the health of the whole family,” she said.