Poverty relief work continues to see success

About 95 percent of people living below the Chinese poverty line will be lifted out of poverty, and more than 90 percent of counties will be removed from the list of areas suffering from extreme poverty by year's end, a senior poverty relief official said on Friday.

China has lifted about 82.39 million residents and 436 counties out of impoverishment since late 2012. The country aims at eradicating extreme poverty — which it defines as living with less than 2,300 yuan ($322) in annual income — by the end of 2020.

In order to achieve this goal, Liu Yongfu, head of the State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation and Development, said at a news conference the country will step up efforts to assist those who slipped back into poverty due to accidents or natural disasters.

"In recent years, we have been taking timely measures to help the newly poor and those who tip back into poverty due to some events," he said. "Surveys have shown the number of people who slipped back into poverty was reduced to under 100,000, compared with about 600,000 in 2016."

The number of the newly poor has also dropped to less than 100,000, compared with more than 1 million in 2016 thanks to these efforts, he added.

Meanwhile, China will continue to boost supervision over poverty alleviation work to root out corruption, according to Liu.

"The central leadership has launched a campaign in 2018 aimed at tackling corruption in the poverty relief sector," he said. "We have replaced, sacked or educated poverty relief officials who have been found to commit malpractice and promoted those who performed well."

Overall, the number of corruption issues concerning poverty alleviation work are declining, he said, adding the proportion of misused funds is at about less than 1 percent, down from over 10 percent as of several years ago.