Chinese President Xi Jinping officially declared on Wednesday that the country has completed its “arduous task” of eradicating extreme poverty, stating that 98.99 million people have been lifted out of it in the past eight years.
“Today we solemnly declare … a complete success in the fight against poverty in the country,” Xi said at a ceremony at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing before thousands of delegates who packed the auditorium.
The president stressed that “regional poverty issues have been resolved” so that China ends its “arduous task of eradicating extreme poverty, creating another incredible miracle.”
He also indicated that 832 rural counties and 128,000 towns have been removed from the poverty list “under current standards” and stressed that this goal is announced in 2021, the centennial year of the founding of the Communist Party of China (CPC).
Since China launched the reform and opening-up program in the late 1970s, the country has lifted 770 million people out of poverty, thereby contributing to nearly 70 percent of global poverty reduction. during this period.
4,000 yuan a year
In 2012, China set a goal of ending extreme poverty by 2020, ten years ahead of what the United Nations set in its Millennium Development Goals.
According to the president, the eradication of extreme poverty has been possible with “a realistic and pragmatic approach” and thanks to “the political advantages of the socialist system, which can pool the necessary resources to undertake great tasks.”
China has invested about 1.6 trillion yuan (202 billion euros, 246 billion dollars) in the past eight years in fighting poverty, Xi said.
About three million people have worked in the rural areas of the country.
In 2019, China set the extreme poverty threshold at 4,000 yuan a year, which represents 1.6 dollars a day (1.3 euros) while the one established by the World Bank in 2015 is 1.9 dollars a day ( 1.5 euros).
According to the heads of the Chinese Office for Poverty Reduction, the country’s threshold calculated in real purchasing power is 2.2 dollars per day (1.8 euros).
