【精英翻譯】的部落格

Due to aging, South Korean population headed for structural reversal 高齡化使南韓人口面臨結構性反轉

精英翻譯社轉自http://iservice.ltn.com.tw/Service/english/english.php?engno=1049318&day=2016-11-06

◎茅毅

Residents of Sinpyeong township in Uiseong County, North Gyeongsang Province, were getting ready for their autumn harvest on Oct. 12. Cutting rice plants was an urgent task, they said - and all of the work is done by local village women in their seventies and older.

慶尚北道義城郡新平面（譯按：「面」、「洞」為南韓地方行政區劃之一）的居民，準備迎接其10月12日的秋收。他們說，當務之急是收割稻作—而這些工作都由當地70幾歲和更高齡的村婦包辦。

At 56 square kilometers Sinpyeong is about 18 times larger in area than Seoul’s Yeouido neighborhood , but its 11 villages include not one obstetrician’s clinic, daycare center, or preschool. What it does have is 15 senior citizen centers.

56平方公里的新平面，約首爾的汝矣島洞的18倍大，但新平面以下的11個行政里（譯按：南韓的「里」分為法定里、行政里）內，一間婦產科診所、托兒所或幼兒園都沒有，只有15間老人活動中心。

"There’s exactly one elementary school student in our neighborhood, but he doesn’t have any friends to play with, so he always follows us old women to the senior citizen center," Kim Tae-bun, 74 said.

74歲的金太分（譯音）說：「我們這附近的確有一名小學生，但他沒有任何朋友能一起玩，所以總是跟著我們這些老太婆去老人活動中心。」

According to an index of "local community endangerment" for 3,482 townships and neighborhoods nationwide by researcher Lee Sang-ho of the Korea Employment Information Service, Sinpyeong was ranked as the community most likely to disappear in 30 years. The index in question represents the ratio of residents over 65 to the female population aged 20 to 39. A total of 1,383 townships and neighborhoods, or roughly one-third the total, fall in the "endangered" category.

根據「韓國雇用情報院」研究員李相浩（譯音）就全南韓3482個「面」及「洞」所做的「地方消滅危險」指數，30年內最可能消失的就是「新平面」。前述指數代表某地65歲以上居民與20至39歲女性人口的比率。佔全南韓約3分之1、共1383個的「面」和「洞」，在分類中淪為「有消滅危險」。