"“I won’t do agricultural work. As I will be a graduate, I will do work which is suitable and worth my educational level. We can rent out our lands to uneducated and landless villagers who can only do agricultural work.” – A 20-year old university student in FGD, Sagaing Region This was the decisive reply I received from a university student in Si Pin Gyi village in Kalay Myo, when I asked if he would be a farmer like his father.[1] He is not the only one who doesn’t want to do agricultural work as his career. Nowadays, to be a farmer is like donkey-work for most youth, especially for the educated ones. In my interviews in the rural areas, interviewees said that they found agricultural work to be very tiring as well as low in income and value – particularly when comparing this with their educational qualifications. The agricultural sector plays a vital role in Myanmar’s economy. According to the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the agricultural sector in Myanmar contributes 37.8 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP), accounts for 25 to 30 percent of total export earnings and provides jobs for 70 percent of the labour. It is significant that agricultural work has historically provided labourers in rural areas with numerous job opportunities. Moreover, according to the villagers I interviewed, there are now increasingly higher numbers and different types of other jobs available in their villages. The other option for them nowadays also includes migration, both internal and external. Due to my experiences with research in rural areas, I came to question whether the youth, the next generation of farmers, would choose to do agricultural work if they had other career options. Last year, I went to the Delta region for research on the socio-economic conditions 10 years after Cyclone Nargis. I conducted qualitative research in 10 villages in the Delta region, doing key informant interviews and focus group discussions. There, I found out that many people – especially the youth – had left their villages, migrating for work. About half of the youth population in each village migrate as there are no other local job opportunities except agricultural work. In some villages, there are youth running small businesses, such as loudspeaker rental jobs. “I don’t want to do agricultural work in farmlands with mud. I feel dirty and exhausted to do that. I wish I could have a chance to live and work in Yangon.” – 18-year old boy from a village, Ayeyarwaddy Region He has a small snack shop in the village and is also seeking new opportunities in order to get a good job in Yangon. Parents from the rural areas often do not want their children to do exhausting work in the mud like them; many try to support their children’s education for a future job with better working conditions, such as working in a company, or in foreign countries..."