Academic literature on the topic 'Rural-urban migration - Philippines'

This article explores the roles of population, average earnings and employment rates in the sending and host countries on international migration. Using a model designed by Schultz (1982) for rural-urban migration, it also tests the validity of two hypotheses, namely, 1) the Harris-Todaro expected earnings hypothesis and 2) the symmetry hypothesis of effects of sending and host area variables on migration. The empirical analysis examines international migration from the Philippines to 26 non-Middle Eastern countries in the period 1981–1995. It uses fixed effects panel data regression method to determine the impact of the economic variables in the sending and host countries. Finally, it looks into the influence of economic transformations in the Philippines and the host countries, as well as the relaxation of migration policies by the host countries on the actual migration of Filipinos in the period 1987–1995.

PurposeThe Health of Philippine Emigrants Study (HoPES) longitudinally investigates over 3 years whether migrating from the Philippines to the USA results in increased risk for obesity relative to non-migrants in the Philippines. The study is designed to test the healthy immigrant hypothesis by collecting health measures from migrants starting from a pre-migration baseline and enrolling a non-migrant cohort matched on age, gender and education for comparison.ParticipantsA migrant cohort (n=832; 36.5% of eligible individuals) was recruited from clients of the Commission on Filipinos Overseas prior to exiting the Philippines. A non-migrant cohort (n=805; 68.6% eligible individuals) was recruited from community households in municipalities throughout the cities of Manila and Cebu. By intention, these two cohorts are comparable demographically, including urban/rural status of residency in the Philippines at baseline.Findings to dateAt baseline, compared with non-migrants, migrants report significantly better self-rated health and less depression, and have significantly larger hip circumference and lower waist-to-hip ratio, as well as significantly higher mean systolic blood pressure and higher mean level of apolipoprotein B. Baseline results can offer insight into the health status of both migrant and non-migrant populations and may be useful for obesity prevention efforts.Future plansLongitudinal data collection is scheduled to be completed in December 2020 when the final data collection wave (36 months after baseline) will conclude. Both migrant and non-migrant cohorts will be maintained beyond the current prospective study, so long as research funding allows and emerges for new study questions. Findings from future longitudinal analyses can inform the need and design of health-related/relevant interventions, whether clinical, behavioural, educational, or policy, that can be implemented at the individual or population level.

The Filipino family, the fundamental unit of Philippine society, is confronted with pressures of a rapidly changing society. Over the past decades, there have been significant changes in its composition, size, structure, support systems and organization arising from demographic, social and economic changes. Poverty and rapid social change have created stress situations that affect the family’s ability to perform its function of caring and nurturing of children. Of particular concern is the displacement of families arising from rural-urban migration, high unemployment and underemployment and overseas employment. Such displacement has contributed to family instability and disorganization as manifested in reported increases in child abandonment, abuse and neglect, street children, prostitution and family violence involving children as victims.

Climate change induced sea-level rise (SLR) is on its increase globally. Regionally the lowlands of China, Vietnam, Bangladesh, and islands of the Malaysian, Indonesian and Philippine archipelagos are among the world’s most threatened regions. Sea-level rise has major impacts on the ecosystems and society. It threatens coastal populations, economic activities, and fragile ecosystems as mangroves, coastal salt-marches and wetlands. This paper provides a summary of the current state of knowledge of sea level-rise and its effects on both human and natural ecosystems. The focus is on coastal urban areas and low lying deltas in South-East Asia and Vietnam, as one of the most threatened areas in the world. About 3 mm per year reflects the growing consensus on the average SLR worldwide. The trend speeds up during recent decades. The figures are subject to local, temporal and methodological variation. In Vietnam the average values of 3.3 mm per year during the 1993-2014 period are above the worldwide average. Although a basic conceptual understanding exists that the increasing global frequency of the strongest tropical cyclones is related with the increasing temperature and SLR, this relationship is insufficiently understood. Moreover the precise, complex environmental, economic, social, and health impacts are currently unclear. SLR, storms and changing precipitation patterns increase flood risks, in particular in urban areas. Part of the current scientific debate is on how urban agglomeration can be made more resilient to flood risks. Where originally mainly technical interventions dominated this discussion, it becomes increasingly clear that proactive special planning, flood defense, flood risk mitigation, flood preparation, and flood recovery are important, but costly instruments. Next to the main focus on SLR and its effects on resilience, the paper reviews main SLR associated impacts: Floods and inundation, salinization, shoreline change, and effects on mangroves and wetlands. The hazards of SLR related floods increase fastest in urban areas. This is related with both the increasing surface major cities are expected to occupy during the decades to come and the increasing coastal population. In particular Asia and its megacities in the southern part of the continent are increasingly at risk. The discussion points to complexity, inter-disciplinarity, and the related uncertainty, as core characteristics. An integrated combination of mitigation, adaptation and resilience measures is currently considered as the most indicated way to resist SLR today and in the near future.References Aerts J.C.J.H., Hassan A., Savenije H.H.G., Khan M.F., 2000. Using GIS tools and rapid assessment techniques for determining salt intrusion: Stream a river basin management instrument. 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This paper explores the effects of labour movement into nonfarm activities on household production choices in rural Vietnam. It finds that agricultural production declines and there are negative effects on farm revenue. However, these conclusions are limited in the north. Households in the north readjust their production structure by investing in livestock and other crops that require less labour. Rice farmers in the south have managed to keep their rice production unaffected by hiring more labour, and investing more capital to switch to less labour-intensive farming. The evidence of relaxing liquidity constraints is found, at least in the short run. While the decline in agricultural revenue in the north suggests some level of substitution between farming and nonfarm activities, the stability in rice production at the national level brings good news to policy makers and food security in Vietnam, despite rapid structural change over the past decades. Keywords Nonfarm, food security, rice self-sufficiency, agricultural transformation, household agricultural production References Akram-Lodhi, A.H., 2005. Vietnam’s agriculture: processes of rich peasant accumulation and mechanisms. Journal of Agrarian Change, 5(1), pp.73–116.Barrett, B., Reardon, T. and Webb, P., 2001. Nonfarm income diversification and household livelihood strategies in rural Africa: concepts, dynamics, and policy implications. Food Policy, 26, pp. 315–331.Brennan, D. et al., 2012. Rural-urban migration and Vietnamese agriculture. In Contributed paper at the 56th AARES Annual Conference. Fremantle, Western Australia.Dang, KS., Nguyen, NQ., Pham, QD., Truong, TTT. and Beresford, M 2006. Policy reform and the transformation of Vietnamese agriculture, in Rapid growth of selected Asian economies: lessons and implications for agriculture and food security, Policy Assistance Series 1/3, FAO, Bangkok.De Brauw, A., 2010. Seasonal Migration and Agricultural Production in Vietnam. Journal of Development Studies, 46(1), pp.114–139.Glewwe, P., Dollar, D. and Agrawal, N., 1994. Economic growth, poverty, and household welfare in Vietnam, World Bank, Washington, DC.Haggblade, S., Hazell, P. and Reardon, T., 2007. Transforming the rural nonfarm economy. The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, Maryland.Hazell, P. and Rahman, A., 2014. New directions for smallholder agriculture 1st ed., Oxford University Press, New York.Hoang, T.X., Pham, C.S. and Ulubaşoǧlu, M., 2014. Non-farm activity, household expenditure, and poverty reduction in rural Vietnam: 2002-2008. World Development, 64, pp.554–568.Huang, J., Wang, X. and Qiu, H.G., 2012. Small-scale farmers in China in the face of modernization and globalization, International Institute for Environment and Development/HIVOS, London.Kajisa, K., 2007. Personal networks and non-agricultural employment: the case of a farming village in the Philippines. Economic Development and Cultural Change, 55(4), pp.668–707.Kilic, T, Carletto, C, Miluka, J. and Savastano, S., 2009. Rural nonfarm income and its impact on agriculture: Evidence from Albania. Agricultural Economics, 40(2), pp.139–60.Lanjouw, J. and Lanjouw, P., 2001. The rural non-farm sector: issues and evidence from developing countries. Agricultural Economics, 26, pp.1–23.Li, L., 2013. Migration, remittances, and agricultural productivity in small farming systems in Northwest China. China Agricultural Economic Review, 5(1), pp.5–23. Minot, N., 2006. Income diversification and poverty in the Northern Uplands of Vietnam, International Food Policy Research Institute, Washington, DC.Minot, N. and Goletti, F., 1998. Export liberalization and household welfare: the case of rice in Vietnam. American Journal of Agricultural Economics, 80(4), pp.738–749.Nguyen, H.Q., 2017. Analyzing the economies of crop diversification in rural Vietnam using an input distance function. Agricultural Systems, 157, pp. 148-156.Oseni, G. and Winters, P., 2009. Rural nonfarm activities and agricultural crop production in Nigeria. Agricultural Economics, 40(2), pp.189–201.Otsuka, K., Liu, Y. and Yamauchi, F., 2013. Factor endowments, wage growth, and changing food self-sufficiency: Evidence from country-level panel data. American Journal of Agricultural Economics, 95(5), pp. 1252–1258.Pham, VH, Nguyen, TMH, Kompas, T, Che, TN. and Bui, T., 2015. Rice production, trade and the poor: regional effects of rice export policy on households in Vietnam. Journal of Agricultural Economics, 66(2), pp. 280–307.Pingali, P.L., Xuan, V.T. and Khiem, N.T., 1998. Prospects for sustaining Vietnam’s re-acquired rice export status. Food Policy, 22(4), pp. 345–358.Rozelle, S., Taylor, J.E. and DeBrauw, A., 1999. Migration, remittances, and agricultural productivity in China. American Economic Review, 89(2), pp.287–291.Stampini, M. and Davis, B., 2009. Does non-agricultural labor relax farmers’ credit constraints? Evidence from longitudinal data for Vietnam. Agricultural Economics, 40(2), pp.177–188.Taylor, J.E. and Martin, P.L., 2001. Human capital: migration and rural population change. In G. Rausser & B. Gardner, eds. Handbook of Agricultural Economics, vol 1A. New York: Elsevier Science, pp. 457–511.Taylor, J.E., Rozelle, S. and De Brauw, A., 2003. Migration and incomes in source communities: a new economic of migration perspective from China. Economic Development and Cultural Change, 52(1), pp.75–101.Taylor, J.E. and Lybbert, T., 2015. Essentials of Development Economics, University of California Press, Berkeley.Thirwall, A.P., 2006. Growth and development with special reference to developing economies 8th ed., Palgrave Macmillan, New York.van de Walle, D. and Cratty, D., 2004. Is the emerging non-farm market economy the route out of poverty in Vietnam? Economics of Transition, 12(2), pp.237–274.Warr, P., 2009. Aggregate and sectoral productivity growth in Thailand and Indonesia, Working Papers in Trade and Development, 2009/10, Arndt-Corden Department of Economics, Australian National University.Warr, P., 2014. Food insecurity and its determinants. Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, 58(4), pp. 519-37.Weiss, C.R., 1996. Exits from a declining sector: econometric evidence from a panel of upper-Austrian farms 1980-1990, Working Paper No. 9601, Department of Economics, University of Linz.Wiggins, S, Kirsten, J. and Llambí, L., 2010. The future of small farms. World Development, 38(10), pp. 1341–48.World Bank, 2006. Vietnam: business, Development Report No 34474-VN, Hanoi, Vietnam. KeywordsNonfarm, food security, rice self-sufficiency, agricultural transformation, household agricultural production References Akram-Lodhi, A.H., 2005. Vietnam’s agriculture: processes of rich peasant accumulation and mechanisms. Journal of Agrarian Change, 5(1), pp.73–116.Barrett, B., Reardon, T. and Webb, P., 2001. Nonfarm income diversification and household livelihood strategies in rural Africa: concepts, dynamics, and policy implications. Food Policy, 26, pp. 315–331.Brennan, D. et al., 2012. Rural-urban migration and Vietnamese agriculture. In Contributed paper at the 56th AARES Annual Conference. Fremantle, Western Australia.Dang, KS., Nguyen, NQ., Pham, QD., Truong, TTT. and Beresford, M 2006. Policy reform and the transformation of Vietnamese agriculture, in Rapid growth of selected Asian economies: lessons and implications for agriculture and food security, Policy Assistance Series 1/3, FAO, Bangkok.De Brauw, A., 2010. Seasonal Migration and Agricultural Production in Vietnam. Journal of Development Studies, 46(1), pp.114–139.Glewwe, P., Dollar, D. and Agrawal, N., 1994. Economic growth, poverty, and household welfare in Vietnam, World Bank, Washington, DC.Haggblade, S., Hazell, P. and Reardon, T., 2007. Transforming the rural nonfarm economy. The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, Maryland.Hazell, P. and Rahman, A., 2014. New directions for smallholder agriculture 1st ed., Oxford University Press, New York.Hoang, T.X., Pham, C.S. and Ulubaşoǧlu, M., 2014. Non-farm activity, household expenditure, and poverty reduction in rural Vietnam: 2002-2008. World Development, 64, pp.554–568.Huang, J., Wang, X. and Qiu, H.G., 2012. Small-scale farmers in China in the face of modernization and globalization, International Institute for Environment and Development/HIVOS, London.Kajisa, K., 2007. Personal networks and non-agricultural employment: the case of a farming village in the Philippines. Economic Development and Cultural Change, 55(4), pp.668–707.Kilic, T, Carletto, C, Miluka, J. and Savastano, S., 2009. Rural nonfarm income and its impact on agriculture: Evidence from Albania. Agricultural Economics, 40(2), pp.139–60.Lanjouw, J. and Lanjouw, P., 2001. The rural non-farm sector: issues and evidence from developing countries. Agricultural Economics, 26, pp.1–23.Li, L., 2013. Migration, remittances, and agricultural productivity in small farming systems in Northwest China. China Agricultural Economic Review, 5(1), pp.5–23. Minot, N., 2006. Income diversification and poverty in the Northern Uplands of Vietnam, International Food Policy Research Institute, Washington, DC.Minot, N. and Goletti, F., 1998. Export liberalization and household welfare: the case of rice in Vietnam. American Journal of Agricultural Economics, 80(4), pp.738–749.Nguyen, H.Q., 2017. Analyzing the economies of crop diversification in rural Vietnam using an input distance function. Agricultural Systems, 157, pp. 148-156.Oseni, G. and Winters, P., 2009. Rural nonfarm activities and agricultural crop production in Nigeria. Agricultural Economics, 40(2), pp.189–201.Otsuka, K., Liu, Y. and Yamauchi, F., 2013. Factor endowments, wage growth, and changing food self-sufficiency: Evidence from country-level panel data. American Journal of Agricultural Economics, 95(5), pp. 1252–1258.Pham, VH, Nguyen, TMH, Kompas, T, Che, TN. and Bui, T., 2015. Rice production, trade and the poor: regional effects of rice export policy on households in Vietnam. Journal of Agricultural Economics, 66(2), pp. 280–307.Pingali, P.L., Xuan, V.T. and Khiem, N.T., 1998. Prospects for sustaining Vietnam’s re-acquired rice export status. Food Policy, 22(4), pp. 345–358.Rozelle, S., Taylor, J.E. and DeBrauw, A., 1999. Migration, remittances, and agricultural productivity in China. American Economic Review, 89(2), pp.287–291.Stampini, M. and Davis, B., 2009. Does non-agricultural labor relax farmers’ credit constraints? Evidence from longitudinal data for Vietnam. Agricultural Economics, 40(2), pp.177–188.Taylor, J.E. and Martin, P.L., 2001. Human capital: migration and rural population change. In G. Rausser & B. Gardner, eds. Handbook of Agricultural Economics, vol 1A. New York: Elsevier Science, pp. 457–511.Taylor, J.E., Rozelle, S. and De Brauw, A., 2003. Migration and incomes in source communities: a new economic of migration perspective from China. Economic Development and Cultural Change, 52(1), pp.75–101.Taylor, J.E. and Lybbert, T., 2015. Essentials of Development Economics, University of California Press, Berkeley.Thirwall, A.P., 2006. Growth and development with special reference to developing economies 8th ed., Palgrave Macmillan, New York.van de Walle, D. and Cratty, D., 2004. Is the emerging non-farm market economy the route out of poverty in Vietnam? Economics of Transition, 12(2), pp.237–274.Warr, P., 2009. Aggregate and sectoral productivity growth in Thailand and Indonesia, Working Papers in Trade and Development, 2009/10, Arndt-Corden Department of Economics, Australian National University.Warr, P., 2014. Food insecurity and its determinants. Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, 58(4), pp. 519-37.Weiss, C.R., 1996. Exits from a declining sector: econometric evidence from a panel of upper-Austrian farms 1980-1990, Working Paper No. 9601, Department of Economics, University of Linz.Wiggins, S, Kirsten, J. and Llambí, L., 2010. The future of small farms. World Development, 38(10), pp. 1341–48.World Bank, 2006. Vietnam: business, Development Report No 34474-VN, Hanoi, Vietnam.

Since the highly successful inauguration of PORTAL in January 2004, we have received many kind expressions of support from international studies practitioners in a range of fields, and from such places as Canada, Italy, Mexico, Nigeria, New Zealand, Spain, Trinidad, the U.K., and the U.S.A. Particularly gratifying have been the endorsements of the journal and its publishing aims by people involved in their own electronic publishing enterprises. For their generous responses to PORTAL, the Editorial Committee would like to express its collective appreciation to the following people: Professor Jean-Marie Volet, of the University of Western Australia, and the guiding editor of the ground-breaking e-journal Mots Pluriels (www.arts.uwa.edu.au/MotsPluriels); and Francis Leo Collins, member of the Editorial Committee for the Graduate Journal of Asia Pacific Studies (GJAPS), based in Auckland, New Zealand. PORTAL's readers may be interested in the current call for papers from GJAPS (www.arts.auckland.ac.nz/gjaps), for a special issue on "Imagining the Asia-Pacific" (deadline October 31, 2004). This issue of PORTAL contains essays that cover wide terrain: the Chilean diasporic community in Australia; the world of German intellectuals; contemporary Mexican socio-political movements; rural-urban migration in China; and transnational advocacy networks and election monitoring in the Philippines, Chile, Nicaragua and Mexico. In the cultural section of this issue, we are delighted to present a short story from the noted German Studies scholar Anthony Stephens, and the first half of a beautiful, deeply poetic and haunting novel entitled Son, from the London-based writer and art-critic Jennifer Higgie. The novel’s second and final part will appear in PORTAL vol. 2, no. 1, in January 2005. On a different note, we would like to express our support for the inaugural Ubud Writers and Readers Festival, to be held in Ubud, Bali, from October 11 to 17, 2004. The Festival, which is attracting interest from writers across the world, maintains a website at: http://www.ubudwritersfestival.com/ Finally, I would like to remind readers that the next issue of PORTAL (vol. 2, no. 1, January 2005) will be a special issue devoted to "Exile and Social Transformation." I would also like to encourage international studies practitioners and cultural producers working anywhere in the world to submit material for future issues. Paul Allatson, Chair, PORTAL Editorial Committee

Metalcraft and Livelihood Enterprise Development of the University of Northern Philippines was implemented through its Extension Services Office focused on trainings to farmers, out-ofschool youth, and adults in rural communities in the province of Ilocos Sur, to enhance their creativity and skills in metal craft production. Areas included in the project were Vigan City, Sta. Maria, San Emilio, Sto. Domingo, Lidlidda and Santiago. The prime intension of having this program was to provide cooperators a lucrative business opportunity and become local entrepreneurs rather than migrating to urban areas or even working abroad. The program has been funded by the government of Spain through Ahencia Española Cooperacion Incorporada. A total of P2,002,093.07 has been provided and was used to train cooperators or beneficiaries of the project and used for the acquisition of tools and equipments used in the implementation of the project. A total of 53 cooperators were trained for three months. Trainings focused on production and reproduction, maintenance and repair of steel windows, grills, fences, gates, low cost nonmechanized agricultural rice tracer, plow, and the other farm implements. To ensure sustainability of the project implemented, the University organized the cooperators to form an association and had it registered under the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). For the association to operate as an enterprise, the STEAM-Municipal Science Technology Application Project (MSTAP) of the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) provided them a seed capital with zero interest. Further, project cooperators borrowed complete tools and equipment for them to use in starting of their own livelihood projects with the assistance of the Agencia Española Cooperacion Incorporada. For the sustainability of the project, a memorandum of agreement was crafted and signed between the University and the cooperators. The project through the different associations had been able to achieved an average gross sale of P530,000 per quarter and having an average net income of P40,000.00 per quarter. Among the seven (7) livelihood organizations, the Gray Metalcraft Livelihood Association was noted for generating higher sales and income. Keywords - Metalcraft, Livelihood, Enterprise, Development, Nonmechanized, Rural Communities, Philippines

Synonymous with globalism, the mobile phone has become an integral part of contemporary everyday life. As a global medium, the mobile phone is a compelling phenomenon that demonstrates the importance of the local in shaping and adapting the technology. The adaptation and usage of the mobile phone can be read on two levels simultaneously – the micro, individual level and the macro, socio-cultural level. Symbolic of the pervasiveness and ubiquity of global ICTs (Information and Communication Technologies) in the everyday, the mobile phone demonstrates that the experiences of the local are divergent in the face of global convergence. The cultural significance of mobile technologies sees it often as a symbol for discussion around issues of democracy, capitalism, individualism and redefinitions of place. These debates are, like all forms of mediation, riddled with paradoxes. As Michael Arnold observes, mobile media is best encapsulated by the notion of “janus-faced” which sees an ongoing process of pushing and pulling whereby one is set free to be anywhere but is on a leash to whims of others anytime. This paradox, for Arnold, is central to all technologies; the more we try to overcome various forms of distance (geographic, temporal, cultural), the more we avoid closeness and intimacy. For Jack Qui, mobile technologies are indeed the ultimate “wireless leash”. These paradoxes see themselves played in a variety of ways. This is particularly the case in the Asia-Pacific region, which houses divergence and uneven adoption, production and consumption of mobile technologies. The region simultaneously displays distinctive characteristics and a possible future of mobile media worldwide. From the so-called ‘centres’ for mobile innovation such as Tokyo and Seoul that have gained attention in global press to Asian “tigers” such as Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan that demonstrate high penetration rates (Singapore has a 110% penetration rate), the region often plays out its dynamics through mobile technologies. The Philippines, for example, is known as the ‘texting capital of the world’ with 300 million text messages sent per day. Moreover, the region has taken central focus for debates around the so-called democratic potential of the mobile phone through examples such as the demise of President Joseph Estrada in the Philippines and the election of President Roh in South Korea (Pertierra, Transforming Technologies; Kim). Through the use of mobile technologies and the so-called rise of the “prosumer” (consumer as producer), we can see debates about the rhetoric and reality of democracy and capitalism in the region. In the case of nascent forms of capitalism, the rise of the mobile phone in China has often been seen as China’s embrace, and redefinition, of capitalism away from being once synonymous with westernisation. As Chua Beng Huat observes, after the 1997 financial crisis in the region notions of consumerism and modernity ceased to be equated with westernization. In the case of China, the cell phone has taken on a pivotal role in everyday life with over 220 billion messages – over half the world’s SMS – sent yearly in China. Despite the ubiquity and multi-layered nature of mobile media in the region, this area has received little attention in the growing literature on mobile communication globally. Publications often explore ‘Asia’ in the context of ‘global’ media or Asia in contrast to Europe. Examples include Katz and Aakhus’s (eds.) seminal anthology Perpetual Contact, Pertierra’s (ed.) The Social Construction and Usage of Communication Technologies: European and Asian experiences and, more recently, Castells et al., Mobile Communication and Society: A Global Perspective. When publications do focus specifically on ‘Asia’, they single out particular locations in the region, such as Ito et al.’s compelling study on Japan, Personal, Portable, Pedestrian: Mobile Phones in Japanese Life and Pertierra’s eloquent discussion of the Philippines in Transforming Technologies: Altered Selves. This issue of M/C Journal attempts to address the dynamic and evolving role of mobile technologies in the Asia-Pacific region. By deploying various approaches to different issues involving mobile media, this issue aims to connect, through a regional imaginary, some of the nuances of local experience within the Asia-Pacific. As a construct, the region of the Asia-Pacific is ever evolving with constantly shifting economic and political power distributions. The rapid economic growth of parts of the region (Japan, Singapore, Taiwan, Korea, Hong Kong, and now China, Vietnam, Malaysia, the Philippines and Indonesia) over the last two to three decades, has led to increasing linkages between these nations in creating transnational networks. The boundaries of the Asia-Pacific are indeterminate and open to contestation and social construction. Initially, the Asia-Pacific was a Euro-American invention, however, its ‘Asian’ content is now playing a greater role in self-constructions, and in influencing the economic, cultural and political entity that is the Asia-Pacific. There have been alternative terms and definitions proffered to describe or delimit the area posited as the Asia-Pacific in an attempt to acknowledge, or subsume, the hierarchies inherent within the region. For example, John Eperjesi has critiqued the ‘American Pacific’ which “names the regional imaginary through which capital looked to expand into Asia and the Pacific at the turn of the [last] century” (195). Arif Dirlik has also suggested two other terms: ‘Asian Pacific’ and ‘Euro-American Pacific.’ He suggests, “the former refers not just to the region’s location, but, more important, to its human constitution; the latter refers to another human component of the region (at least at present) and also to its invention as a regional structure.” (“Asia-Pacific Idea”, 64). Together, Rob Wilson and Arif Dirlik use the configuration ‘Asia/Pacific’ to discuss the region as a space of cultural production, social migration, and transnational innovation, whereby “the slash would signify linkage yet difference” (6). These various terms are useful only insofar as they expose the ideological bases of the definitions, and identify its centre(s). In this emphasis on geography, it is important not to obscure the temporal and spatial characteristics of human activities that constitute regions. As Arif Dirlik notes, “[an] emphasis on human activity shifts attention from physical area to the construction of geography through human interactions; it also underlines the historicity of the region’s formations” (What Is in a Rim?, 4). The three-part structure of this issue seeks to provide various perspectives on the use of mobile technologies and media – from a macro, regional level, to micro, local case studies – in the context of both historical and contemporary formations and definitions of the Asia-Pacific. In an age of mobile technologies we see that rather than erode, notions of place and locality take on increasing significance. The first four papers by Jaz Hee-jeong Choi, Gerard Raiti, Yasmin Ibrahim, and Collette Snowden & Kerry Green highlight some of the key concepts and phenomena associated with mobile media in the region. Choi’s paper provides a wonderful introduction to the culture of mobile technologies in East Asia, focusing largely on South Korea, China and Japan. She problematises the rhetoric surrounding technological fetishism and techno-orientalism in definitions of ‘mobile’ and ‘digital’ East Asia and raises important questions regarding the transformation and future of East Asia’s mobile cultures. Gerard Raiti examines the behemoth of globalization from the point of view of personal intimacy. He asks us to reconsider notions of intimacy in a period marked by co-presence; particularly in light of the problematic conflation between love and technological intimacy. Yasmin Ibrahim considers the way the body is increasingly implicated through the personalisation of mobile technologies and becomes a collaborator in the creation of media events. Ibrahim argues that what she calls the ‘personal gaze’ of the consumer is contributing to the visual narratives of global and local events. What we have is a figure of the mediated mobile body that participates in the political economy of events construction. The paradoxical role of mobile technologies as both pushing and pulling us, helping and hindering us (Arnold) is taken up in Collette Snowden and Kerry Green’s paper on the role of media reporting, mobility and trauma. Extending some of Ibrahim’s comments in the specific case of the reporting of traumatic events, Snowden and Green provide a wonderful companion piece about how media reporting is being transformed by contemporary mobile practices. As an integral component of contemporary visual cultures, camera phone practices are arguably both extending and creating emerging ways of seeing and representing. In the second section, we begin our case studies exploring the socio-cultural particularities of various adaptations of mobile media within specific locations in the Asia-Pacific. Randy Jay C. Solis elaborates on Gerard Raiti’s discussion of intimacy and love by exploring how the practice of ‘texting’ has contributed to the development of romantic relationships in the Philippines in terms of its convenience and affordability. Lee Humphreys and Thomas Barker further extend this discussion by investigating the way Indonesians use the mobile phone for dating and sex. As in Solis’s article, the authors view the mobile phone as a tool of communication, identity management and social networking that mediates new forms of love, sex and romance in Indonesia, particularly through mobile dating software and mobile pornography. Li Li’s paper takes the playful obsession the Chinese and South Koreans have with lucky numbers and locates its socio-cultural roots. Through a series of semi-structured interviews, the author traces this use of lucky mobile numbers to the rise of consumerism in China and views this so-called ‘superstition’ in terms of the entry into modernity for both China and South Korea. Chih-Hui Lai’s paper explores the rise of Web 2.0. in Taiwan, which, in comparison to other locations in the region, is still relatively under-documented in terms of its usage of mobile media. Here Lai addresses this gap by exploring the burgeoning role of mobile media to access and engage with online communities through the case study of EzMoBo. In the final section we problematise Australia’s place in the Asia-Pacific and, in particular, the nation’s politically and culturally uncomfortable relationship with Asia. Described as ‘west in Asia’ by Rao, and as ‘South’ of the West by Gibson, Yue, and Hawkins, Australia’s uneasy relationship with Asia deserves its own location. We begin this section with a paper by Mariann Hardey that presents a case study of Australian university students and their relationship to, and with, the mobile phone, providing original empirical work on the country’s ‘iGeneration’. Next Linda Leung’s critique of mobile telephony in the context of immigration detention centres engages with the political dimensions of technology and difference between connection and contact. Here we reminded of the luxury of mobile technologies that are the so-called necessity of contemporary everyday life. We are also reminded of the ‘cost’ of different forms of mobility and immobility – technological, geographic, physical and socio-cultural. Leung’s discussion of displacement and mobility amongst refugees calls upon us to reconsider some of the conflations occurring around mobile telephony and new media outside the comfort of everyday urbanity. The final paper, by Peter B. White and Naomi Rosh White, addresses the urban and rural divide so pointed in Australia (with 80% of the population living in urban areas) by discussing an older, though still relevant mobile technology, the CB radio. This paper reminds us that despite the technological fetishism of urban Australia, once outside of urban contexts, we are made acutely aware of Australia as a land containing a plethora of black spots (in which mobile phones are out of range). All of the papers in this issue address, in their own way, theoretical and empirical ‘black spots’ in research and speak to the ‘future’ of mobile media in a region that, while diverse, is being increasingly brought together by technologies such as the mobile phone. Lastly, we are pleased to include a photo essay by Andrew Johnson. Entitled Zeitgeist, this series of artworks sees Johnson exploring the symbolic dimensions of the hand phone in South Korea by drawing on the metaphor of the dust mask. According the Johnson, these images refer to ‘the visibility and invisibility of communication’ that characterises the spirit of our time. The cover image is by Larissa Hjorth as part of her Snapshots: Portrait of the Mobile series conducted whilst on an Asialink residency at Ssamzie space (Seoul, South Korea) in 2005. The editors would like to offer a special note of thanks to all of our external reviewers who answered our pleas for help with willingness, enthusiasm, and especially, promptness. This issue could not have been completed without your support. References Arnold, Michael. “On the Phenomenology of Technology: The ‘Janus-Faces’ of Mobile Phones.” Information and Organization 13 (2003): 231-256. Castells, Manuel, et al., Mobile Communication and Society: A Global Perspective. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2007. Chua, Beng Huat, ed. Consumption in Asia. London: Routledge, 2000. Dirlik, Arif. “The Asia-Pacific Idea: Reality and Representation in the Invention of a Regional Structure.” Journal of World History 3.1 (1992): 55-79. Dirlik, Arif, ed. What Is in a Rim? Critical Perspectives on the Pacific Region Idea. Boulder: Westview, 1993. Eperjesi, John. “The American Asiatic Association and the Imperialist Imaginary of the American Pacific.” Boundary 2 28.1 (Spring 2001): 195-219. Gibson, Ross. South of the West: Postcolonialism and the Narrative Construction of Australia. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana UP, 1996. Ito, Mizuko, Daisuke Okabe, and Misa Matsuda, eds. Personal, Portable, Pedestrian: Mobile Phones in Japanese Life. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2005. Katz, James E., and Mark Aakhus, eds. Perpetual Contact: Mobile Communications, Private Talk, Public Performance. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2002 Kim, Shin Dong. “The Shaping of New Politics in the Era of Mobile and Cyber Communication.” Mobile Democracy: Essays on Society, Self and Politics. Ed. Kristof Nyiri. Vienna: Van Passen Verlag, 2003. Pertierra, Raul, ed. The Social Construction and Usage of Communication Technologies: European and Asian Experiences. Singapore: Singapore UP, 2005. –––. Transforming Technologies: Altered Selves. Philippines: De La Salle UP, 2006. Qui, Jack. “The Wireless Leash: Mobile Messaging Service as a Means of Control.” International Journal of Communication 1 (2007): 74-91. Rao, Madanmohan, ed. News Media and New Media: The Asia-Pacific Internet Handbook. Singapore: Times Academic Press, 2004. Wilson, Robert, and Afir Dirlik, eds. Asia/Pacific as Space of Cultural Production. Durham: Duke UP, 1995. Yue, Audrey. “Asian Australian Cinema, Asian-Australian Modernity.” Diaspora: Negotiating Asian-Australia. Eds. Helen Gilbert et al. St Lucia: U of Queensland P, 2000. 190–99. Yue, Audrey, and Gay Hawkins. “Going South.” New Formations 40 (Spring 2000): 49-63. Citation reference for this article MLA Style Hjorth, Larissa, and Olivia Khoo. "Collect Calls." M/C Journal 10.1 (2007). echo date('d M. Y'); ?> <http://journal.media-culture.org.au/0703/00-editorial.php>. APA Style Hjorth, L., and O. Khoo. (Mar. 2007) "Collect Calls," M/C Journal, 10(1). Retrieved echo date('d M. Y'); ?> from <http://journal.media-culture.org.au/0703/00-editorial.php>.

The main purpose of this study is to ascertain the extent to which the fertility of migrant women in the Philippines is different from that of non-migrants. The 1983 National Demographic Survey (NDS) was the source of data for attaining the objectives of this study and ascertaining: (1) the profile of migrants at the time of first move; (2) the characteristics of migrants and non-migrants at the time of survey; (3) differences in cumulative and current fertility behaviour according to migration status; (4) differences in average pregnancy intervals of migrants before and after their latest move with those of non-migrants; and (5) whether differences in the fertility pattern among the sampled currently married women was due to the moves they have made or some other explanatory variables. The primary investigation included the use of crosstabulations, standardizations, and multivariate analysis (specifically, multiple classification analysis). Relatively minor support was accorded to the conceptual framework put forward by the study which was based on traditional concepts rationalizing the interrelationship between fertility and migration. The general pattern that emerged from the tables on cumulative fertility of migrants and non-migrants points to very little variation in the mean number of children ever born in younger ages but some distinct differences in older ages, even after controlling for education, labour force participation and contraceptive use status. The findings on current fertility, as demonstrated by the age-specific marital fertility rates, point to lower fertility among migrants whose place of destination was urban and higher fertility among those whose place of destination was rural. But again, the differences are not pronounced. When contrasting the pregnancy intervals of migrants after their latest move with the average pregnancy intervals of non-migrants, the findings illustrate the propensity of the latter to have longer pregnancy intervals. The resulting figures, however, reveal only slight differences between the two. This, more or less, concurs with the findings from the analysis of cumulative and current fertility. Finally, results of the multiple classification analysis indicate that migration had a negligible contribution to explaining the variations in cumulative fertility compared to the other socio-economic and demographic variables included in the model. One possible conclusion is that migration does not in itself raise fertility rates by bringing high fertility women in urban areas. However, because migration is age selective and contributes to inflating the age groups in the peak reproductive years, it has the potential to raise the number of births in cities and contribute to the natural increase in urban growth. Hence, it may be worthwhile considering the strategy of using the country's population redistribution policy as a mechanism for fertility reduction.