> All I was trying to say was that using the average suicide rate may be misleading when the population is so diverse, and urbanisation is concentrated in certa

> All I was trying to say was that using the average suicide rate may be misleading when the population is so diverse, and urbanisation is concentrated in certain areas. OK then, let's separate out the rural and urban suicide rates in China. Turns out that the rural suicide rate is 3 times higher than the urban suicide rate[0]. And this is mirrored in the reduction in the suicide rate when rural Chinese go to work at mega-factories like those run by Foxconn. 0: http://www.freakonomics.com/2011/09/09/chinas-suicide-rate-among-the-highest-in-the-world/ http://www.freakonomics.com/2011/09/09/chinas-suicide-rate-a... > Suicide in the rural population in India, for instance, is a major problem due to the ready availability of agricultural chemicals. Actually, it has nothing to do with the presence of agricultural chemicals. There are a million ways of killing onself, and suicide occurred in India long before agricultural "chemicals" had been invented. It's a common misconception that Indian farmer suicides are a result of the presence of multinational agricultural giants like Monsanto. However, if you look at the data (which I can't find right now, but it's probably available online), you'll see that Indian farmer suicides occur in spurts, usually when something happens that kills their crop (drought, bug infestation, etc.). The use of agricultural chemicals is just a misguided attempt on the part of the farmers to show the "cause" of their misfortunes. The real problem is the temperamental nature of Indian agriculture, which is unfortunately a much more complex target than big bad multinationals and thus conveniently ignored. Another common misconception is that the sales of genetically modified crops have driven Indian farmer suicides. However, the last spike in suicides was in the late 90s, several years before Monsanto began selling GM crops in India.