Beijing: As many as 10,000 singletons are
expected to converge at Shanghai`s largest ever matchmaking
party next week, but a greater number of single women will
have to fight it out for lesser number of eligible bachelors.
The hugely popular event will be held at Thames Town next
weekend and organisers said they had to stop taking bookings
at a point to prevent any chaos.
However, the organisers who had expected an even split
between men and women, had to settle for five women for every
four men.
Some attributed the situation to the rising number of
single women even as concerns over sex ratio, skewed towards
men, have been growing.
According to last year`s census, Shanghai alone has more
than five lakh single women aged between 20 and 50 years,
which was an increase from fewer than one lakh in early 1990s.
Statistics showed the number of single women had gone up
more than the number of single men in the last decade.
Unmarried women account for near 20 percent of the total
female population - up 2.2 percentage points from 2000, while
for men the figure is 23.6 percent, up one per cent.
Organisers say the event is badly needed in Shanghai as
people of prime marriage age - especially women with high
education backgrounds and good incomes have trouble finding
partners.
They said such women want to find men with similar
backgrounds, narrowing their options.
In addition to the 10,000 men and women looking for love,
4,000 parents will also be present to chaperone them.
"I won`t place all my hopes on one matchmaking party, but
I won`t let any opportunity for my daughter go," Yuan Jian,
mother of a 27-year-old woman told Shanghai Daily.
It is in many ways a contrasting problem for Chinese
officials as the trend beats growing concerns over sex ratio.
According to census figures of 2010, there were 118 males
for every 100 females, with estimates stating that several
million men may have to either remain bachelors or look for
brides from outside China.
In fact, another trend showed a number of Chinese men were
going for Vietnamese women.
PTI
