Lizhuang () is a

town A town is a human settlement. Towns are generally larger than villages and smaller than cities, though the criteria to distinguish between them vary considerably in different parts of the world. Origin and use The word "town" shares an ori ...

Dangshan County Dangshan County () is a county in the far north of Anhui, Anhui Province, China. It is under the administration of Suzhou, Anhui, Suzhou city. It is famous for fruits (pear, peach, plum and watermelon). Administrative divisions Dangshan County a ...

Suzhou Suzhou (; ; Suzhounese: ''sou¹ tseu¹'' , Mandarin: ), alternately romanized as Soochow, is a major city in southern Jiangsu province, East China. Suzhou is the largest city in Jiangsu, and a major economic center and focal point of trade ...

Anhui Province Anhui , (; formerly romanized as Anhwei) is a landlocked province of the People's Republic of China, part of the East China region. Its provincial capital and largest city is Hefei. The province is located across the basins of the Yangtze River ...

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

. As of the

2010 Chinese Census The 2010 Chinese census, officially the Sixth National Population Census of the People's Republic of China (中華人民共和國第六次全國人口普查), was conducted by the National Bureau of Statistics of the People's Republic of China wi ...

, Lizhuang has a population of 45,817. The town has a humid subtropical climate. Many in Lizhuang are farmers, growing

corn Maize ( ; ''Zea mays'' subsp. ''mays'', from es, maíz after tnq, mahiz), also known as corn (North American and Australian English), is a cereal grain first domesticated by indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 10,000 years ago. Th ...

pomegranates The pomegranate (''Punica granatum'') is a fruit-bearing deciduous shrub in the family Lythraceae, subfamily Punicoideae, that grows between tall. The pomegranate was originally described throughout the Mediterranean region. It was introduc ...

, and various

vegetables Vegetables are parts of plants that are consumed by humans or other animals as food. The original meaning is still commonly used and is applied to plants collectively to refer to all edible plant matter, including the flowers, fruits, stems, ...

. There is also a small

coal mine Coal mining is the process of extracting coal from the ground. Coal is valued for its energy content and since the 1880s has been widely used to generate electricity. Steel and cement industries use coal as a fuel for extraction of iron from ...

in the town. Many of Lizhuang's adults have migrated elsewhere for work, leaving a large number of left-behind children to be raised by their grandparents. Traditional houses in the town are made from stone held together with a paste made from ashes.

Remittance A remittance is a non-commercial transfer of money by a foreign worker, a member of a diaspora community, or a citizen with familial ties abroad, for household income in their home country or homeland. Money sent home by migrants competes wit ...

s from migrant workers have enabled some residents to construct homes with modern building materials such as bricks,

roofing tile Roofing can mean: *Roofing material, used in the construction of a roof *Rooftopping, roof hacking for high risk photos *The profession of a roofer See also

* Roof, for general description of roofs and roofing {{disambig ...

and

cement A cement is a binder, a chemical substance used for construction that sets, hardens, and adheres to other materials to bind them together. Cement is seldom used on its own, but rather to bind sand and gravel ( aggregate) together. Cement mix ...

Administrative divisions

Lizhuang administers three residential communities and five administrative villages.

Residential communities

Lizhuang administers the following three residential communities: * Zhenxing Community () * Zhudian Community () * Bianlou Community ()

Administrative villages

Lizhuang administers the following five administrative villages: * Haisheng Xincun Village () * Liyuan Xincun Village () * Wangge Village () * Zhendong Village () * Jialou Village ()

Demographics

According to the

, Lizhuang has a population of 45,817, down from the 49,845 recorded in the

2000 Chinese Census The 2000 Chinese census, officially the Fifth National Population Census of the People's Republic of China (), was conducted by the government of the People's Republic of China with 1 November 2000 as its zero hour. The total population was calcula ...

. In 2010, a

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the Un ...

reporter wrote a story on Lizhuang, using it as a microcosm for the growing phenomenon of

left-behind children in China In China, "left-behind children" (), also called "stay-at-home children", are children who remain in rural regions of the country while their parents leave to work in urban areas. In many cases, these children are taken care of by their extende ...

. In the story, the reporter found few able-bodied adults in the town, as many left to find more lucrative work elsewhere. Much of Lizhuang's elderly population was left taking care of their children.

Economy

Many people in Lizhuang are subsistence farmers, and common crops in the town include

, and various

. The town also has a

, although it is not as large as those found in surrounding towns.

References

Dangshan County {{Suzhou, Anhui-geo-stub Towns in Anhui