A village in China’s mountainous west where schoolchildren must climb an 800-metre (2,625-foot)-high bamboo ladder secured to a sheer cliff face may get a set of steel stairs to improve safety.
The concerns arose after striking pictures were taken of the children in Sichuan province’s Zhaojue county in a scene that underscores the vast gap in development between prosperous, modern eastern China and parts of the remote inland west that remain mired in poverty.
Media reports said the ladder is the only access to the village of Atuleer to which the children return every two weeks from the school at which they board. The 72 families who live there are members of the Yi minority group and live mainly by farming potatoes, walnuts and chili peppers.
