Central Poverty Alleviation and Development Conference

　　The Central Poverty Alleviation and Development Conference was held in Beijing on November 29, 2011. Hu Jintao, General Secretary of the CPC Central Committee, President of the People's Republic of China and Chairman of the CPC Central Military Commission attended the event and delivered an important speech. He stressed that poverty alleviation and development is a long-term and significant task as well as a noble and great cause. Bearing in mind the importance and urgency of anti-poverty work, the whole party and society should enhance the consciousness and firmness for poverty alleviation and development and do a good job in poverty alleviation and development with greater determination, intensified efforts and more effective initiatives in order to achieve the target of building a comprehensively well-off society in China by 2020.

　　The CPC and government leaders Wu Bangguo, Wen Jiabao, Jia Qinglin, Li Changchun, Xi Jinping, Li Keqiang, He Guoqiang and Zhou Yongkang were present at the conference. Wen Jiabao delivered a speech at the event and Li Keqiang presided over the meeting.

　　In his speech, Hu Jintao pointed out that this conference is an important meeting convened at the beginning of the implementation of the "12th Five-Year Plan" when China entered into the critical period for building a moderately prosperous society. The main task of the meeting is: To sum up China’s achievements and experience in poverty alleviation and development, analyze the current and future poverty alleviation and development situation and tasks, make overall deployment for the implementation of the "Outline for Development-oriented Poverty Reduction for China's Rural Areas (2011-2020)", mobilize the whole party and all social forces to get involved and do a good job in the new round of poverty alleviation and development.

　　Hu stressed that poverty eradication, improvement of people's livelihoods and common prosperity is the fundamental requirement of socialism, the major task of the reform and opening up and socialist modernization and the unswerving goal of the whole Party and people of all nationalities. Since the founding of New China, the government has always attached great importance to the cause of poverty alleviation and development. Especially since the reform and opening up, the party and government officially launched the nationwide planned, organized large-scale development-oriented poverty alleviation and made remarkable achievements in poverty alleviation and development, playing an important role in promoting China's economic development, political stability, national unity, border consolidation and social harmony and making a significant contribution to the cause of global poverty reduction.

　　Hu stressed that the practice has fully proved that after three decades of unremitting efforts since the launch of reform and opening up, we have successfully embarked on the poverty alleviation and development path with Chinese characteristics. At present, China has entered a new stage of poverty alleviation and development focusing on consolidating the outcomes of addressing food and clothing problems, accelerating poverty reduction, improving the ecological environment, enhancing development capacity and narrowing development gap from the stage giving priority to providing adequate food and clothing. Poverty alleviation and development not only has a more favorable basis and conditions, but also faces new difficulties and challenges. It is of great significance to safeguarding the fundamental interests of the people, consolidating the party's base, ensuring the stability of the state and achieving the grand goal of building a moderately prosperous society and socialist modernization to further promote poverty alleviation and development and do a good job of poverty alleviation and development in the new stage

　　To promote the poverty alleviation and development in the new stage, Hu stressed, we must hold high the great banner of socialism with Chinese characteristics, follow the guidance of Deng Xiaoping Theory and the important thought of Three Represents, thoroughly implement the Scientific Outlook on Development, raise the standard of poverty alleviation, increase investment, make contiguous impoverished areas with special difficulties the key target areas, give top priority to addressing food and clothing problem for the poor to lift them out of poverty as soon as possible, adhere to the guidance of the government, insist on a balanced development, pay more attention to the transformation of the mode of economic development, more attention to strengthening the capacity of self-development of the poor, the equalization of basic public services and pay more attention to resolve acute problems restricting development, and strive for better and faster economic and social development in poor areas.

　　By 2020, Hu pointed out, the general target of poverty alleviation and development is to ensure the nation’s impoverished will no longer need to worry about food and clothing and ensure their access to compulsory education, basic medical care and housing. The growth rate of the per capita net income of farmers in poor areas is expected by be higher than the national average, the main indicators of basic public services will be close to the national average and the trend of widening development gap will be reversed. We should adhere to the development-oriented poverty alleviation, implement the effective convergence of poverty alleviation and development and rural minimum living security system, take poverty alleviation and development as the main way to reduce poverty, take social security as a basic means to solve the problem of food and clothing; adhere to the balanced development of urban and rural areas, continue to combine poverty alleviation and development with urbanization, the construction of a new socialist countryside and the protection of the ecological environment and promote the harmony between economic and social development and population, resources and environment. We should adhere to government leadership and hierarchical accountability, highlight the emphasis and give classified guidance, adhere to public participation for joint promotion and adhere to the principal position of the objects of poverty reduction to stimulate the inherent vitality of poverty-stricken areas.

　　Hu pointed out that the "Outline for Development-oriented Poverty Reduction for China’s Rural Areas (2011-2020)" issued by the central government makes an overall deployment on the poverty alleviation and development work in the new stage. The central government clarified the new national poverty line. The Party committees and governments at all levels should step up action to carry out the work, highlight work priorities and resolve key problems to ensure continuous breakthroughs and progress, vigorously promote the key problem tackling for poverty alleviation in contiguous poor areas with special difficulties, consolidate and develop the large-scale poverty reduction pattern integrating special poverty alleviation, industrial poverty alleviation and social poverty alleviation, improve the security system of pro-poor policies and strengthen international exchange and cooperation in the field of poverty alleviation and development.

　　Hu stressed that the anti-poverty work at the new stage is an urgent, arduous task. We must strengthen the leadership and do solid work to effectively implement the deployments made by the central government. Party committees and governments at all levels should attach great importance to anti-poverty work, strengthen supervision, inspection, examination and evaluation of poverty alleviation and development work and strengthen the management of the use of anti-poverty funds. We must effectively strengthen the construction of grassroots organizations and make grass-roots party organizations a strong core of leadership to promote scientific development, lead the farmers to get rich, build close relations with the masses and maintain the stability in rural areas. We should strengthen the development of leaders for poverty alleviation and set up a group of high-quality cadres with a hard-working style and dedication spirit for poverty alleviation. The cadres who have long worked in impoverished regions and made outstanding achievements should be praised and promoted. We should effectively strengthen the research and publicity of poverty alleviation and include poverty reduction into the coverage of basic national conditions education to create a good atmosphere for the whole society to care about and support poverty alleviation and development.

　　Wen Jiabao pointed out in his speech that in the long-term practice, especially in the past decade, we’ve continuously improved the national poverty alleviation strategy and policy system and successfully embarked on the poverty alleviation and development path with Chinese characteristics with economic development as the driving force and the enhancement of self-development capacity of poverty-stricken people as the fundamental way, combining government leadership, social assistance and the main role of farmers, combining inclusive policies and preferential policies, and linking poverty alleviation and development with social security. We adhere to balanced economic and social development in urban and rural areas, practice the policy for industry to support agriculture, urban areas to support rural areas, and the guideline of giving more and taking less. The government has abolished the agricultural tax, provided a variety of agricultural subsidies, strengthened rural infrastructure construction and constantly increased fiscal transfer payment and special poverty-relief funds for impoverished regions. The anti-poverty funds allocated by the central and local governments increased from 12.75 billion Yuan in 2001 to 34.93 billion Yuan in 2010. Spending during the decade amounted to 204.38 billion Yuan. Over the past decade, the average annual growth rate of the rural per capita net income of 592 national key poor counties was above the national average.

　　Wen stressed that we should continue to improve the poverty alleviation and development policies with the economic and social development and the phasic changes in poverty alleviation and development. The central government decides to raise the poverty line for farmers to 2,300 Yuan (2010 constant price), which is up 92 percent compared to the standard set in 2009. It is a kind of social progress and a major initiative to intensify poverty alleviation to raise the poverty line and include more low-income people into the coverage of poverty reduction. The development in various regions is uneven. Economically developed areas can set a higher local poverty line based on their actual situations and capacity. We should comprehensively promote the poverty alleviation in contiguous poor areas with special difficulties, take 11 contiguous poor areas with special difficulties including Liu Panshan, Tibet, the Tibetan areas of Sichuan, Yunnan, Gansu and Qinghai as well as the three prefectures in South Xinjiang as the main battlefield, and launch pilot projects for regional development and poverty reduction in Wuling Mountain areas. The central and provincial financial departments should significantly increase general transfer payments for these regions. The additional anti-poverty funds from the central government should be mainly used in contiguous poor areas with special difficulties. The arrangements for large-scale national projects, key projects and emerging industries should give priority to eligible poor areas. Pilot nutrition improvement project for rural students in the stage of compulsory education should be launched in 680 counties (cities) of contiguous poor areas with special difficulties. The mechanism for fixed-point contact should be established. One central ministry is responsible for contacting one contiguous poor area and give guidance on program implementation. Various provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions may determine some contiguous poor areas with special difficulties for special support based on the actual situations. We should pay equal attention to the development-oriented poverty alleviation and social security in rural areas. In a certain period of time in the future, the allocation of increased government investment in social security should give priority to rural areas, especially impoverished regions. The new rural social pension insurance is expected to achieve full coverage of rural residents next year.

　　Other central government leaders present at the meeting included: Wang Qishan, Hui Liangyu, Liu Qi, Li Yuanchao, Wang Yang, Zhang Gaoli, Zhang Dejiang, Yu Zhengsheng, Bo Xilai, Ling Jihua, Li Jianguo, Dai Bingguo and Qian Yunlu.

　　Other people present at the event include the members of the Central Rural Work Leading Group, the members of the State Council Leading Group of Poverty Alleviation and Development, the principals of various provinces, autonomous regions, municipalities and cities with independent planning status as well as Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, and the comrades from  relevant department of central and state organs involved in fixed-point poverty alleviation, the financial institutions under the administration of the central government, backbone state-owned enterprises and relevant departments of the army.

　　The first plenary meeting of the central poverty alleviation and development conference is a videophone conference with the Small Auditorium of the Great Hall of the People as the main venue. Sub-venues were set in the provinces, autonomous regions, municipalities and cities with independent planning status as well as Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps.