Poverty Alleviation and Development in Yunnan Province

　　【Overview】 Located at the southwest border of China, Yunnan Province covers an area of 394,000 square kilometers and has 16 prefectures (cities) and 129 counties (cities, districts). As of the end of 2009, it had a population of 45.71 million. Yunnan has 73 national key counties and 7 provincial key counties for poverty alleviation and development, ranking first in China; and has a poor population of 5.4 million, accounting for 13.9% of the poor in China, ranking second in the country.

　　In 2009, Yunnan allocated 2.537 billion Yuan of provincial and state anti-poverty funds, 500 million Yuan more than that in 2008, integrated funds of nearly 1.5 billion Yuan and invested anti-poverty credit loans of 3.67 billion Yuan, both achieving double-digit growth year on year and hitting a record high.

　　【Investment of anti-poverty funds】 In 2009, periodical results had been achieved in the poverty alleviation for Mang people and Kemu people and a total of 141 million Yuan was invested, accounting for 107% of the annual plan; 85% of the 12 projects for food and clothing, road building and water supply were completed, three Mang people villages were established, and 168 households and 833 Mang people moved to the new houses. Meanwhile, it implemented poverty alleviation among Bo people and invested 53.56 million Yuan, including 12.28 million Yuan from the provincial poverty alleviation office and 900,000 Yuan from Shanghai, mainly for the development of featured industries. Meanwhile, it started support for Shanyao Branch of Yao people and planned to launch 6 projects to solve their food and clothing problem. In 2009, the provincial government invested start-up funds of 44.75 million Yuan, implemented 27 entire village advancement projects, relocated 2,000 people and solved housing problems for 100 families. Meanwhile, it launched the comprehensive development program for the entire village advancement and entire town promotion of Dulongjiang Town, issued the “Implementation Opinions on the Three-year Action Plan for the Entire Village Advancement and Entire Town Promotion of Dulongjiang Town” and planned to invest more than 800 million Yuan to implement six projects including housing, food and industrial projects, etc. Meanwhile, the government increased support for border areas, invested 329 million Yuan for 25 border counties and implemented 657 entire village advancement projects in poor villages, with investment of 500,000 Yuan for each village. Based on the entire village advancement, it carried out the activities of establishing “Party Branch in Leading People to Get Rich” and fostering “Foregoers in Shaking off Poverty and Getting Rich”.

　　【Entire Village Advancement】 In 2009, the province completed the entire village advancement of 9446 poor natural villages, accounting for 105% of the scheduled task, and the projects in 2450 villages were constructed with the funds raised by local governments.

　　In 2009, 6 million Yuan was invested in each town and the province launched the pilot projects of entire village advancement in 19 towns. The prefectures and cities all completed the annual construction tasks; special funds of 10 million Yuan were allocated for each county and pilot projects were launched in ten counties.

　　【Poverty alleviation by relocation】 Anti-poverty funds of 316 million Yuan was issued for relocation-based poverty reduction, 623 million poor people that lost basic living conditions were relocated, doubled the planned figure. The province completed the construction of 75% of the major projects, such as housing, human and livestock drinking water and basic farmland projects and relocated 30,000 poor people. At the same time, the provincial development and reform commission put in work-relief funds of 127 million Yuan and relocated 25,400 poor people.

　　【Poverty alleviation training】 In 2009, the province invested 100 million Yuan for labor transfer trainings and organized labor transfer trainings for 300,000 people in poor areas through order contract signing, oriented- assignment and cooperation between schools and enterprises, including skills trainings for 60,000 people. According to preliminary estimates, the average monthly income of each trained migrant worker reached 900 Yuan or more.

　　【Poverty alleviation by industrialization】 In 2009, more than 3 billion Yuan of discount loans for rural households was issued for poverty alleviation by industrialization, which benefited more than 335,000 poor rural families with income growth per household of 1,000 Yuan or more. The government allocated 660 million Yuan of project discount loans to support 111 farming and industrialization projects; the provincial financial departments put in anti-poverty funds of 85.40 million Yuan, which accelerated the development of featured industries; issued 30 million Yuan of village-level mutual funds to launch pilot projects in 300 villages, and completed the planting of cash crops of 1.2 million mu and economic forests of 1.8 million mu and the breeding of 700,000 livestock as well.

　　【Construction of old revolutionary base areas】  For the construction of old revolutionary base areas, the government allocated 740 million Yuan, invested in 15 million Yuan of special funds and integrated 75 million Yuan of other funds to support the construction of infrastructure, housing, farmland, irrigation, industrial development, technology training and the maintenance and protection of old revolutionary sites.

　　【Renovation of dilapidated buildings for poor rural households】 60 million Yuan of anti-poverty funds was put in for the renovation of dilapidated buildings for poor rural households, of which 50 million Yuan was financial anti-poverty funds and 10 million Yuan was local bond funds, and the  thatched houses and dangerous houses of 10,000 households were relocated. Based on entire village advancement, the local governments of various prefectures and cities raised money to solve the housing problem of more than 70,000 people.

　　【Social poverty alleviation】 Shanghai provided anti-poverty funds of 160 million Yuan for Yunnan, constructed 327 helping-the-poor projects in 26 impoverished counties of four cities, namely Honghe, Wenshan, Pu’er and Diqing, and carried out cooperation with Yunnan in the field of science and technology, education, culture, economy and trade. On the 11th joint meeting of the leading group for Shanghai-Yunnan Cooperation in Poverty Alleviation, the two sides’ leaders signed the minutes of meeting and clarified the key points for helping-the-poor in 2010, and 15 departments directly under the provincial government signed work memos with Shanghai. While supporting De’an people’s poverty reduction, Shanghai included Dulong Nationality into the targets of poverty reduction and donated 20 million Yuan, forming a working structure of “4+2”. It organized relevant people from four cities and more than 50 enterprises to participate in Shanghai Spring Festival Expo, helped sign 15 project contracts valued 614 million Yuan and helped introduce investment of 580 million Yuan from Shanghai, which promoted the market development of Yunnan’s featured products in Shanghai.

　　The province also strengthened its communication and contacts with 27 units directly under the central organs and directly put in cash and materials as well as introduced funds of 1.529 billion Yuan.

　　As for international cooperation, the province continued to implement the WB loan poverty alleviation projects, carried out cooperation with Humana People to People, Bestseller Foundation, Ford Foundation NGO, etc and increased funds of 73.41 million Yuan for the construction of six projects in impoverished areas, including the education, training, health care, community’s comprehensive services, rural infrastructure construction, etc.