The All-China Women's Federation, China's largest women's organization, vowed on Wednesday to play a bigger role in preventing suicide in China, especially among women.

With rapid economic growth and acceleration of urbanization process, China is suffering an increasing suicide toll. Research shows that about 280,000 Chinese die by suicide every year, of which over 150,000 are women.

Wu Xuehua, a senior staff member with the All-China Women's Federation, said China is one of the few countries in the world with higher suicide rates in women than men.

"Unlike other countries, China has a very high rate of suicide in young rural females, among whom suicide is the leading cause of death and represents over 30 percent of all deaths," she said at an international workshop.

"The reasons for this are not very clear," said Wu, adding that investigations showed that many of the young women felt they had no way out of unhappiness and regarded suicide the only possible way to escape their intolerable situation.

Wu said the federation had started a number of pilot programs across the country including crisis hotlines and women's shelters, to give women opportunities to discuss their problems and resolve issues.

But one problem was that many women at high risk of suicide were unwilling to seek help, said Wu. "So we must activate a community-based monitoring system for identifying women at high risk and offering help to them."

"We also need to work at creating strong social support networks to improve the conditions of women so that they won't see suicide as the only way out of misery," Wu said.

However, preventing suicide among women and providing support is not something the women's federation could do on its own, neither was it the sole responsibility of the medical sector, she said.

"Suicide prevention is clearly a complex problem that needs to be addressed by the coordinated action of multiple government departments and non-governmental agencies," said Wu.

"The All-China Women's Federation strongly supports drafting a national suicide prevention plan and is willing to become an active member of the program," she said.

The two-day workshop gathered representatives from China's departments of health, public security, agriculture, relevant non- government organizations and officials from the World Health Organization (WHO) and other international agencies.

Participants will discuss a framework for the national prevention plan jointly submitted by the Beijing Suicide Research and Prevention Center and the Chronic Disease Center under the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

(Xinhua News Agency November 19, 2003)