The number of children born to multicultural families is rising at a fast pace. This comes at a time when the country is struggling with a low birthrate, raising the need for the country to come up with viable measures to embrace interracial families more effectively.
According to Statistics Korea last week, 22,014 babies were born to multiracial families last year, up 8.4 percent from 2010, and the rate compares with a 0.2 percent increase for Korean couples. The figure accounted for 4.7 percent of all newborns in the country in 2011, which means that one of 20 newborn babies is from multicultural families.
The statistics office said the number of new marriages between Korean and foreign spouses dropped in 2011 from a year earlier due largely to stronger restrictions imposed on marriage brokers in countries such as Vietnam. The decrease was attributed largely to a host of problems associated with international marriages such as fraudulent matchmaking.
Given the stark reality of the nation’s low birthrate, the government can’t afford to overlook possible problems arising from the rapid emergence of multicultural families. This explains why we should place top priority on creating an environment in which multiracial children are integrated into our society smoothly.
Yet the reality is the opposite because many of them face difficulty in adjusting here. Of particular concern is a language problem and this is all the more serious if moms can’t speak Korean well. According to the Ministry of Health and Welfare, 18.6 percent of 2-year-olds with a multicultural background develop language skills more than six months later than toddlers whose parents are both Korean. The number jumps to 67.2 percent among 6-year-olds.
Also, discrimination and bullying often haunt children with multicultural backgrounds. The serial arson case involving a 17-year-old Russian-Korean boy in March is an example of how serious the consequences of the multicultural family problem could be unless tackled properly. The youngster shocked the nation by confessing that he set fire to houses and a school after being ridiculed by his friends since his elementary school days because of his appearance. His father died when he was young and his Russian mother refused to raise him.
Even worse is that interracial families suffer from hardships because most of them live in rural areas where finding good jobs is difficult.
In March, the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology unveiled a package of measures aimed at helping children from cross-cultural families adapt to the Korean school system. They include increasing the number of preparatory schools from three to 26 nationwide next year to provide more multicultural children with opportunities to learn the Korean language and culture before they enter regular schools.
But the government’s support measures leave a lot to be desired. The most important thing is to help provide multicultural families with diverse vocational education as well as opportunities to land decent jobs.