Revised social aid programs meet the challenge

Relief measures provided as COVID pandemic adds to difficulties faced

The massage shop Wu Shunyang runs with his wife is not only one of the few sources of earning for the blind couple, but also covers the tuition of their son, a sixth-grader, and daughter, who studies at a polytechnic school.

When the COVID-19 pandemic forced a nationwide lockdown earlier this year, the shop was forced to close. And after it reopened, it had few visitors. The family, who live in Dajin, a village in Yongan, Fujian province, sank into desperation.

Wu said that the family, which was included in the national poverty registration program in 2016, had invested virtually all their savings into the business two years ago, and local authorities also helped fund the undertaking with zero-interest loans.

They had just managed to pay off the loans at the end of last year.

"I felt downhearted every day. We could barely cover the daily necessities for a family of four," the 43-year-old said.

The government's social aid program scaled up its relief measures when Wu's family needed it most. They received a total aid package of 10,600 yuan ($1,585) from different government departments in recent months and saw their monthly relief package increased from 580 to 708 yuan per family member starting in July.

"I can't imagine how we would have gotten by without the welfare program during those months," he said.

As this is the final year in China's campaign to eradicate absolute poverty and build a moderately prosperous society in all respects, the country has scaled up the coverage and intensity of aid packages for low-income groups to ensure the goals will not be compromised by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Broader safety net

In an article published in June in the Qiushi Journal, the flagship magazine of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, President Xi Jinping highlighted the need to refine the country's system of subsistence allowances as part of broader measures to fix the weak links in the anti-poverty campaign.

Xi, who is also general secretary of the CPC Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, said measures such as social insurance, aid and welfare programs must be comprehensively applied to ensure adequate living standards for poor people who are unable to make a living.

He called for all poor people to be included in the basic health insurance network for rural and urban residents and insurance programs for major diseases and medical aid to prevent illness from driving people into poverty.

The ministries of finance and civil affairs said in a notice released in June that all eligible residents who have difficulty providing for themselves due to the pandemic must be included in the government's social aid program.

The expanded program must reach those who cannot find jobs or who saw their businesses shut down due to the pandemic, and authorities at various levels must step up monitoring of groups who could once again sink into poverty, the notice said.

There were 5.51 million rural residents who had not yet been lifted from poverty by the end of last year, and the COVID-19 pandemic has added to poverty by causing job losses and business closures.

China's tightly woven social security network－especially the social aid programs－is the last line of defense to ensure that the poverty alleviation goals will be met by the end of this year, said Li Xiaoyun, a China Agricultural University professor specialized in rural development and poverty alleviation.

"With China already able to build a basic security network for the most impoverished group, the COVID-19 pandemic will not affect the fundamentals of the poverty reduction campaign," he said.