The empty stools of rural village life in China

Tian Yunxiu, 67, and his 65-year-old wife named Liu Dezhen, sit beside a buckwheat field in Mawan town of Northwest China's Shaanxi province with six stools for their six children, who left the village to work. In the process of urbanization, more rural people in China leave villages to work in cities with most working as migrant workers. The statistics of National Bureau of Statistics shows that China already had a total of 230 million migrant workers in 2009. As it is not easy to take families to settle down in cities, the migrant workers from rural areas have to leave their kids, wives and parents in their rural home, which makes the population of some rural areas mainly made up of women, kids and elderly people. A survey conducted by China Agriculture University shows that there are about 87 million people left behind in rural area, comprised of 20 million kids, 20 million elderly people and 47 million women. [Photo/Xinhua]

Wang Guixian, 61, and his wife Zhang Shumei, with four stools reserved for their four children who left home to work, sit in front of their home in a village of Mawan county, Jingbian county, Northwest China's Shaanxi province, August 24, 2011.[Photo/Xinhua]