Out of poverty, into moderate prosperity

LI MIN/CHINA DAILY

On Feb 25 2021, President Xi Jinping announced that China had completed the arduous task of eradicating extreme poverty.

The eradication of extreme poverty in a country with nearly one-fifth of the world's population 10 years ahead of the target set by the United Nations for the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development is a remarkable contribution to the cause of global poverty alleviation and building a better and prosperous world.

In order to eradicate extreme poverty and build a moderately prosperous society in all respects, the Communist Party of China rolled out the strategy of targeted poverty alleviation, keeping in mind the real conditions in the country and learning from the experiences of other countries.

By screening and registering poverty cases, the poverty alleviation officials identified "who exactly needed help". By strengthening leadership and capacity building, they identified "who should implement anti-poverty programs". By implementing tailored programs, the officials ensured all impoverished households were lifted out of poverty. By setting strict criteria for and adopting a gradual approach to poverty alleviation, they identified households and individuals that had been lifted out of poverty so their names could be removed from the "poverty list". And by monitoring the progress of the poverty alleviation work, they ensured the success of the mission.

The measures taken differed from individual to individual, village to village, township to township, and county to county, because the causes and levels of poverty differed from family to family and community to community. In particular, the five effective measures taken to eradicate poverty were increasing production, relocating households, providing ecological compensation, improving education standards, and giving allowances.

Industrial development-led poverty alleviation, for example, proved the most straightforward, effective and sustainable, as it created jobs and increased people's incomes. Poverty-stricken areas were encouraged to develop industries with local resources and features, and new forms of businesses such as e-commerce and tourism.

E-commerce can directly boost people's incomes, because it enables products from remote areas to be sold not only across China but also in other countries. In fact, e-commerce is said to have created about 7.71 million rural jobs and increased the income of some 6.18 million poor people.

Moreover, local Party organizations and members played a key role in eradicating extreme poverty. Party secretaries at the provincial, municipal, county, township and village levels were responsible for poverty alleviation work. By the end of 2020, a total of 255,000 teams and more than 3 million top local officials had been stationed on the frontline of the battle against poverty. And they fought shoulder to shoulder with over 2 million township officials and millions of village officials to eliminate absolute poverty. By the time the battle against extreme poverty was won at the end of 2020, more than 1,800 people had sacrificed their lives to make the lives of others better.

The Party mobilized all sections of society, including governments at all levels and the market to eradicate absolute poverty. In this process, collaboration between the eastern and western regions proved very effective. For example, the nine relatively well developed eastern provinces paired up with 14 provinces in western and central China to boost the fight against poverty.

Between 2015 and 2020, more than 100 billion yuan ($14.05 billion) of budgetary funds and social assistance was allocated by the nine eastern provinces to their paired counterparts in the western and central regions, 131,000 officials and professionals were exchanged, and over 1.1 trillion yuan had been invested by over 22,000 eastern enterprises in the impoverished regions.

The Party also implemented programs to promote the creativity of the impoverished people. For instance, to turn the assistance receivers into helpers in Ximeng county, Yunnan province, poverty alleviation committees introduced special programs to help local lazybones and alcoholics to give up their bad habits and work for the betterment of their family and community. Especially, villagers were encouraged to rely on their own efforts to emerge out of poverty.

Thanks to the poverty alleviation program, the incomes of poor people have increased dramatically. Rural per capita disposable income in impoverished regions grew from 6,079 yuan in 2013 to 12,588 yuan in 2020 — at an average annual growth rate of 11.6 percent.

We know from the Party's experience of eradicating extreme poverty that:

Putting people first and following the principle of people-centered development hold the key to successful poverty alleviation. Only by doing so can all poverty-stricken people be identified and poverty eradicated.

The ruling party must build a strong governance capacity. Since poverty alleviation is a daunting task, it is vital that leaders fulfill their commitment to the people and have the capability to mobilize all sectors of society to fight for a good cause and maintain policy continuity and stability, so as to eradicate poverty.

The ruling party must also take the ground realities into consideration. In poverty alleviation work, the Party refused to blindly follow the practices of Western countries or use the strategies listed in international organizations' reports. Challenging many established assumptions in development economics, China's experience can inspire developing countries to independently explore their path to poverty alleviation.

It is also important that the ruling party shoulder its due responsibility. With the COVID-19 pandemic still to be controlled in many parts of the world, 70 million to 100 million people risk falling back into extreme poverty.

The Party believes that some countries getting richer and richer while others remaining stuck in poverty is not sustainable for global development.

As such, political parties around the world should honor their commitment to the people and take all necessary measures to alleviate poverty and promote sustainable development in their country, in order to allow the rays of equality and justice to break through the dark clouds of poverty and backwardness and light up the path toward prosperity and a beautiful future.

(The author Zheng Huan is an associate professor in the teaching and research department of Party building of the Party School of the Central Committee of the CPC.)