China’s remaining nine impoverished counties had eliminated extreme poverty, state media reported Monday, marking a milestone in the country’s struggle to lift the poorest above the poverty line.
The counties, all in southwest China’s Guizhou province, had eradicated absolute poverty, the provincial government announced.
“China has promised to eradicate absolute poverty by 2020. At the end of 2019, 52 counties in the northwest, southwest and south of the country were still on the poverty list,” the official Xinhua news agency said in a report.
Fighting poverty has been one of China’s three “critical” battles since 2017, the other two having been to curb pollution and mitigate financial risks.
Last week, seven counties in Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture in Sichuan Province were the latest group of counties to be removed from the national poverty list.
Chinese government statistics say the country has lifted some 850 million out of poverty, contributing more than 70% to global poverty reduction, in recent decades.
The country’s poor rural population fell dramatically from 98.99 million at the end of 2012 to 5.51 million at the end of 2019, and the poverty rate in rural regions fell from 10.2% to 0.6%, according to government statistics.
In September, Chinese President Xi Jinping, speaking via video link in the general debate of the 75th session of the United Nations General Assembly, said the country is fully confident that it will comply with the goal of eradication of poverty established in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. and that it will reach that goal 10 years in advance.
What are the criteria for removing a county from the poverty list?
In general terms: “One income, two without worries and three guarantees”
First is the income. The national income standard is the constant price of annual per capita income of 2,300 yuan for farmers in 2010. According to the price index, the current price was 3,218 yuan at the end of last year, and this year it is about 4,000 yuan , according to state media reports.
The two “don’t worry” are about food and clothing.
The “three guarantees” are compulsory education, access to basic health care, and safe housing.
The provinces, however, could have different sets of poverty lines.
However, the Chinese government’s own flattering statistics on poverty alleviation have been questioned.
The debate over the number of poor people in China was reignited last May when Prime Minister Li Keqiang said that the monthly income of some 600 million Chinese was 1,000 yuan (10,000 rupees).
“It is barely enough to cover the monthly rent in a medium-sized Chinese city,” Li said at his annual press conference at the close of China’s rubber stamp legislature, the National People’s Congress (NPC) in Beijing.
Li’s statement took on even more significance as it came in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, which has left the Chinese economy battered.
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