As at the end of 2005, there were 23.65 million needy people in
China with a per capita annual income below 683 yuan (US$85.4), the
nation's poverty line. However, using the UN poverty threshold of
US$1 per capita per day as a benchmark, China in fact has a
population of 200 million poverty-stricken people, the second
largest in the world after India.
The aid-the-poor program that started in 1986 has greatly
reduced China's needy population. However, its task of poverty
relief is still very arduous, according to sources from the First
Forum on Sustainable Development in Poverty-stricken Areas, which
was held in Tianjin's new Binhai district last weekend.
Most of the 23.65 million needy people in China (using the
national poverty line benchmark) live in remote areas with
unfavorable natural and ecological conditions, said Tian Ruizhang,
vice president of the China Association for Poverty Alleviation and
Development (CAPAD).
Their very existence is further threatened by an ever-widening
economic gap between the city and the countryside, and differences
in levels of development in the eastern and western parts of the
country.
According to Professor Li Yining, dean of the Peking University
Institute of Poverty Research, which sponsored the forum, it is
common for the poor to place greater importance on immediate
interests than long-term ones, often ignoring eco-construction and
resource conservation. Fighting an uphill battle against a
deteriorating ecology and overexploitation of natural resources,
impoverished people in remote areas find themselves trapped in a
vicious circle of poverty.
Since 2000, Guizhou and Hunan provinces, both rich in hydroelectric
resources, have been a part of the East-West power transmission
project.
However, the project seems to have fallen short of its
objectives in that it hasn't actually created jobs for people from
the two provinces. "More than 90 percent of the workers employed in
the state-invested project come from other provinces," according to
Lei Ming, vice dean of the poverty research institute.
"And worst of all is that it is the local governments that will
be held responsible for any environmental pollution that arises
from the huge project."
Lei said that this raises the importance of development models
that cater to local conditions.
"Urbanization and poverty elimination are not contradictory to
each other. Consequently, moving surplus labor from the poorer
areas to towns and cities is a feasible plan," Prof. Li told
China Business News on Sunday.
To that end, "aid-the-poor funds should be better used for
skills training for migrant workers so as to reinforce their
competitiveness," suggested Lu Jiehua, a professor from the Peking
University Institute of Population Research.
Last year, the central government launched a campaign to build a
new socialist countryside, which "is good tidings for poor peasants
who are eager to cross the threshold from poverty to prosperity,"
said Hu Fuguo, president of the CAPAD.
Participants at the forum suggested that the central government
should allocate a special fund each year for poverty alleviation in
addition to increasing funding for agricultural development.
"If we cannot help the peasants to realistically shake off
poverty, the construction of a new countryside is nothing but empty
talk," Prof. Li stressed.
The Tianjin Binhai Declaration was adopted during the two-day
forum. The document proposes the following six measures for
sustainable development in poverty-stricken areas:
l????????
Encourage the export of surplus labor from poor areas to towns and
cities;
l????????
Enhance economic cooperation and exchange between the developed
eastern parts of the country and impoverished areas mostly in
central and west China;
l????????
Mobilize people from all walks of life to participate in the
national anti-poverty war;
l????????
Lessen the medical and educational burdens on impoverished parents
with children;
l????????
Promote global anti-poverty cooperation, and assist poor areas in
receiving economic aid from international organizations and
developed countries;
l????????
Increase investment in eco-construction for sustainable social and
economic development in poverty-stricken areas.
(China.org.cn by Shao Da, May 17, 2006)