Poverty Alleviation and Development in Heilongjiang Province

　　【Overview】 Located in the northeastern part of China, Heilongjiang Province covers an area of 456,000 square kilometers and has a population of more than 38 million, 12 cities and one subprovincial administrative office. It possesses 23 national and provincial key counties and 3134 key poverty-stricken villages for poverty alleviation and development and all the 64 counties (cities) in the province have poverty reduction task. At the end of 2009, in rural areas of the province, there were a total of 692,000 poor households and 2.13 million poor people. By the end of 2009, it had completed the entire village advancement of 2384 impoverished villages and lifted 2.15 million people out of poverty. After the implementation of entire village advancement program, the rural per capita income of poor villages reached 2600.

　　【Entire Village Advancement】  Increase efforts on the integration of resources and give priority to the villages involved in entire village advancement in the allocation of financial anti-poverty funds and other agriculture-related funds. A total of 428 million Yuan of central and provincial anti-poverty funds and 217 million Yuan of social poverty relief funds were put in, and the province successfully completed the entire village advancement task of the fourth batch of 750 poor villages.

　　The area of the transferred land in 750 poverty-stricken villages reached 3.151 million mu and 75,000 rural households were involved in, of which 46,000 were poor households; the government supported 17 leading enterprises of industrial poverty reduction and the industrialization bases set up in poor villages covered 57,800 poverty-stricken households; and it implemented mutual funds in 60 pilot poor villages, covering 11,856 rural households.

　　The industrial projects covered 7313 poor households, supported the impoverished households to purchase 427 cows, 3569 meat beef cattle, 3618 live pigs, 2044 sheep, 321500 birds, 150 deer and 960 fox raccoon rabbits, introduce 1115.4 tons of new varieties of food crops and build livestock area of 5660 square meters; built roads of 1587.7 kilometers and 2235 bridges; dug drought resisting wells of 25,000 linear meters, set up 13 animal husbandry technical service stations, 10 mechanized milk stations and greenhouses of 151,000 square meters, purchased 146 (sets of) large agricultural machinery tools, built agricultural machinery warehouses of 1752 square meters; dug 44 human and livestock’s drinking water wells, installed tap water pipelines for 27,000 households, CATV for 16,000 households and 108 street lamps; set up 99 clinics, 87 villagers’ activity rooms, 81 leisure squares and village roadside ditches of 153,000 linear meters.

　　【Poverty alleviation training】  Based on continuous transfer employment trainings, the province implemented whole village trainings and series of transfer programs to promote the transfer of employment of the labors from poor families. The training bases completed the training tasks for 30,000 people and transferred 26,700 people, accounting for 100% of the annual plan; and the whole village training tasks of 255,000 people.

　　【Poverty alleviation by industrialization】In 2009, 7 provincial poverty alleviation leading enterprises were newly identified. With poverty relief loan discount support, the 17 leading enterprises absorbed 3452 labors from poor families; the industrialization base covered 136 poor villages, involving 57,800 poor households. Local governments actively designed industrial projects, encouraged poor villages’ masses to develop industries and supported large-scale agricultural industrial projects to help poor households, poor villages and impoverished areas to shake off poverty and get rich.

　　【Pilot program of mutual funds】  The financial anti-poverty funds of 18 million were arranged for the pilot program of mutual funds. The pilot projects were launched in 60 poor villages of 39 counties, and the average subsidy for each village is 300,000 Yuan. Through absorbing 11,856 rural households to invest as shareholders, the total assets reached 32.4 million Yuan, and there are now 154 pilot villages of mutual funds in the whole province.

　　【Pilot program of poverty alleviation loan discount management system reform】  For this program, the government allocated a total of 12 million Yuan of loan discount funds, covering 40,000 poor households in 3024 impoverished villages, 17 poverty alleviation leading enterprises and 41 pro-poor projects, which effectively solved the funding difficulty for poor households and enterprises to survive and develop.

　　【Pilot contiguous development projects】Based on summarizing the experience of the pilot contiguous development projects in Raohe County and Fuyuan County, the province invested financial anti-poverty funds of 20 million Yuan and integrated funds of 31.426 million Yuan, combined with farmers’ labor inputs, to expand the pilot area to Yanshou County and Tongjiang County.

　　【Large-scale operation through land transfer in impoverished villages】  The large-scale operation through land transfer were launched in 750 impoverished villages involved in the entire village advancement. Through subcontracting and joint-stock cooperation system, the land transfer-based large-scale operation area reached 3,151,000 mu and a total of 75,000 rural households (including 46,000 poor households) were involved in. All the involved poor households have shaken off poverty.

　　【Social poverty alleviation】  The province’s social poverty alleviation funds amounted to 217 million Yuan, of which more than 110 million Yuan was put in for free, and more than 107 million Yuan was introduced funds. 2230 cadres from 10 central organs, 163 provincial organs and 4714 city and county organs visited the target counties, towns and villages for poverty reduction, 2400 projects were constructed, 750 poor villages received assistance and 150,000 farmers received trainings and nearly 1600 poor students received financial aid; 17 poverty alleviation leading enterprises went to poor villages for the development of industrial bases, which drove 57,800 rural households to participate in the industrial development and achieved increase of 5,000 Yuan in income growth per household.

　　【Poverty alleviation measures】  1. Improve the work system to promote the implementation of entire village advancement with high standards. In order to increase the income of the farmers in 750 impoverished villages, the province implemented many projects to support poor households in the development of production, agricultural facility, infrastructure, irrigation facility and social undertakings. First, establish fund integration mechanism. In the whole year, the government integrated a total of 960 million Yuan for entire village advancement program, with 1.28 million Yuan averagely for each village. Secondly, establish the mechanism for the public to participate in poverty alleviation and development. In the 750 poor villages involved in entire village advancement, 690,000 people participated in by labor inputs. Thirdly, establish a working implementation responsibility mechanism. Poverty alleviation and development work responsibility system was set up in the counties (cities) to clarify the responsible leaders and the implementation units and implement the responsibility and tasks. Harbin and Qiqihaer included poverty alleviation and development as well as fixed-point poverty reduction into the work target assessment of departments and counties (cities), which promoted the effective implementation of poverty alleviation and development.

2. Implement the "Rain Plan" to broaden the channels of income of the poor. First, train migrant workers relying on the poverty relief and development labor transfer training bases. All the training bases in the provinces are open to the labors from poor households. Through improved subsidies for training fee, it expanded the scale of participants of the trainings; through allocating training funds based on the proportion of training transfer, it enhanced the transfer employment rate. Secondly, carry out village-reaching trainings. It implemented entire village advancement projects, through organizing courses, demonstration observation, technology service for households and expert instructions, the province organized agricultural advanced technical trainings to enhance the standardization and scientific level of agricultural production. Thirdly, strengthen trainings of leaders. It organized trainings for the party secretaries, village committee directors and business leaders of 750 poor villages involved in entire village advancement, involving 3,936 people in total.

3. Implement poverty alleviation by industrialization to speed up the industrialization process in poverty-stricken areas. First, foster and support leading enterprises in poverty alleviation by industrialization. The province invested 6 million Yuan as loan discount subsidy for 17 poverty alleviation leading enterprises and guided financial sectors to provide loans of 760 million Yuan. Secondly, strengthen the mechanism for linking the benefits of farmers and businesses. Through guiding enterprises and farmers to develop order production, the province strengthened credit education and standardized order contracts to improve compliance rates and protect the interests of both enterprises and farmers. Meanwhile, it guided leading enterprises to support agriculture and provide farmers with technical guidance and information services, sell means of production on credit and provide loan guarantees and other services for farmers as well. Thirdly, strengthen the construction of industrial bases in impoverished areas. Through supporting poor households to introduce and improve the seeds and varieties, the province adjusted and optimized the planting and breeding structure and expanded the coverage of improved seeds; through supporting various kinds of specialized breeding and farming households and the construction of poverty unions and demonstration communities, it accelerated the development of farming and breeding in an appropriate scale, achieved the scalization, specialization and industrialization of agricultural production and enhanced the comprehensive agricultural production capacity. With policy support, drive by enterprises, a large number of agricultural industrialization production bases were set up in the impoverished areas in the province, covering the planting of grain, corn, soybean, beet, flax cultivation, livestock breeding, dairy industry, etc.

4. Continue to promote poverty alleviation and development under the leadership of typical models. Every year, a number of typical models and good examples must be found out to constantly improve the quality of poverty alleviation and development work in the province. After making a breakthrough in land transfer-based large-scale operation, labor transfer training and the development of animal husbandry, featured and non-agricultural industries in poor villages, the government fostered models in high-standard implementation of entire village advancement project in Yilan County and, through holding on-the-spot promotion meetings, summarized the experience of county government in concentrating financial resources for high-standard planning and implementation of entire village advancement projects according to the ideology of building new rural areas, and developing production and increasing farmers’ income by guiding and supporting poor households to create organization forms, which promoted the continuous improvement of the  quality and level of poverty alleviation in various regions and further improved the standards for the construction of entire village advancement projects.