Plan eyes 2020 to help 70m people in rural areas
China vowed on Monday to alleviate poverty for tens of millions of people in rural areas by the end of 2020, a goal to uplift all citizens below the poverty line.
By the end of 2014, 70.17 million people in the countryside were living below the country's poverty line of 2,300 yuan ($376), the Xinhua News Agency reported on Monday.
To eliminate poverty by the end of 2020, the poverty reduction plan must cover a million people per month in the next six years, Hong Tianyun, deputy director of the State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation and Development of China, told a press conference in Beijing on Monday.
"It would be an arduous task if there were no special measures. We feel pressed for time," Hong said.
According to Hong, special measures to reduce poverty include migrating people to more prosperous areas, improving education and medical services and building adequate infrastructure and facilities.
"Poverty has a huge impact on health and education. Because poverty in China is predominantly caused by disease, it is necessary to enhance medical services in rural areas," Wang Sangui, a poverty relief specialist at Renmin University told the Global Times.
He said that promoting education would improve employment in rural areas.
China has made remarkable progress in poverty alleviation. It was the first developing country to meet the Millennium Development Goal of reducing poverty by half ahead of the 2015 deadline.
In the past 15 years, China has lifted more than 600 million people out of poverty, accounting for about 70 percent worldwide, Xinhua reported.
Yu Shaoxiang, an expert on social security at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times that China still faces many challenges to poverty alleviation.
Yu said poverty relief funds should rely on not only the central government, but also funds from local governments, private companies as well as non-governmental organizations.
He added that China's poverty line is lower than the international standard, which means the nation still has a long way to go to eliminate poverty.
The World Bank adjusted the international poverty line on October 4 from $1.25 to $1.90 every day.
"The World Bank poverty line, which is used to compare living standards among countries, cannot serve as the basis of specific alleviation work in each country," Li Chunguang, a senior official of the State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation and Development of China, was quoted by news site china.com.cn as saying on Monday.
President Xi Jinping pledged an initial $2 billion for an assistance fund to help developing nations reach the target in September at a United Nations summit.
