Poverty Alleviation and Development in Anhui Province

　　【Review of the poverty alleviation and development in the “11th Five-Year Plan” period】 A significant increase in investment in poverty alleviation and development. From 2006 to 2010, the central and provincial government issued a total of 3.97 billion Yuan of anti-poverty funds, of which 3.645 billion Yuan was from the central government and 324 million Yuan was provincial matching funds, respectively 1.52 billion Yuan, 1.435 billion Yuan and 84 million Yuan more than that in the “Tenth Five-Year Plan” period.

　　A substantial decline in the number of poor people. The number of rural poor in Anhui Province dropped from 3.84 million at the end of 2005 to 2.0933 million at the end of 2010, with a decrease of 1.7467 million, and the incidence of poverty fell to 3.97%.

　　Steady improvement in the living standards of farmers in impoverished areas. Rural per capita net income increased from 2641 Yuan in 2005 to 5285 Yuan in 2010, up 100%, and the rural per capita net income of the 19 key counties for national poverty alleviation and development rose from 2044 Yuan in 2005 to 4269 Yuan in 2010, up 109%.

　　Significant improvement in the production and living conditions of impoverished areas. From 2006 to 2010, the province implemented entire village advancement in 4,000 key poor villages, built and rebuilt rural roads of 17,106 kilometers; implemented the transformation of 893,500 million mu of farmland, increased and improved irrigation area of 2.2667 million mu, planted forest of 741,000 mu; implemented safe drinking water projects to address the drinking water problem of 2.2627 million people and 1.4531 million head of livestock and relocated 4,362 poor households in poverty reduction.

　　Social undertakings in poverty-stricken areas witnessed development and the overall quality of the poor was improved. From 2006 to 2010, the province built and rebuilt schools of 324,000 square meters, renovated township hospitals (clinics) and village family planning offices of 138,000 square meters, built and innovated village activity rooms of 129,000 square meters; implemented the "Rain Plan" project, transferred 382,000 poor rural labors, transferred employments for 209,000 people, helped more than 30,000 students and organized practical agricultural technology trainings for 973,000 farmers.

　　【Convergence of two systems】 In 2010, pilot projects for the effective convergence of two systems were launched in Yuexi and Lixin County. Through “deciding size based on poverty monitoring and identifying objects according to villagers’ votes”, the government effectively identified the objects of poverty reduction, objects of minimum living security system, objects of both poverty alleviation and subsistence security system and objects of five-guarantee system as well. Pro-poor policies for various types of poor households: provide subsistence allowances to all those meeting the conditions; implement development-oriented poverty alleviation for objects of poverty reduction. Based on the pilot projects in the two counties, the province organized trainings for the service personnel in 47 counties (districts), applied for secret key to government extranet for 37 counties (districts) and arranged full-time management personnel, laying a solid foundation for the convergence of two systems.

　　【Entire village advancement】In 2010, the province implemented entire village advancement in 572 key villages, issued special funds of 737.3 million Yuan for 2,058 entire village advancement projects; built and rebuilt highroads of 2,237 kilometers, built 375 bridges, implemented 454 farmland and water conservancy projects and 238 drinking water projects to address the drinking problem of 225,000 people and 162,000 head of livestock; improved 1342 columns and toilets of 19,945 square meters, built 9,686 biogas digesters, 40 waste disposal plants and 61 rural cultural facilities; built and renovated 73 rural primary and secondary schools of 27,060 square meters, 245 rural clinics and family planning offices of 27,760 square meters, provided assistance for 9,667 students and relocated 431 households and 1,561 people in poverty alleviation.

　　【Labor transfer training - Rain Plan】 In 2010, Anhui provincial government issued 33 million Yuan of financial anti-poverty funds for the implementation of Rain Plan projects, organized trainings for 40,000 surplus labors in impoverished regions, transferred 33,000 labors and helped 31,000 people find stable employments; carried out practical agricultural technical trainings for 140,000 poor farmers; provided financial support for the education of children form needy families, covering nearly 20,000 college and secondary vocational school students; continued to implement the “Biguiyuan” project and trained 1,325 transferred rural retired soldiers; comprehensively practiced the “Rain Plan” information management system and installed management software in the poverty alleviation offices, financial bureaus and training bases of 12 cities and 29 key counties to practice digital management on Rain Plan.

　　【Poverty alleviation by industrialization】 In 2010, the province continued to promote poverty relief discount loan system reform, liberalized restrictions on financial institutions and increased investment in discount loan. The government allocated 23.41 million Yuan of interest subsidies, of which 11.7 million Yuan was for poverty alleviation and 9.45 million Yuan was for household loans; and issued special funds for the construction of industrialization bases and the development of leading industries and backbone sectors to promote income growth of farmers. Meanwhile, it launched 291 industrial development projects, including 124 planting projects, 94 breeding projects and 73 economic fruit forest projects, and issued 20 million Yuan of special funds to support farmers’ cooperatives.

　　【Social poverty alleviation】 In 2010, first of all, the province sent 31 division-level cadres of the provincial authorities to support the poverty alleviation and development in impoverished counties. The Provincial Party Committee sent the fourth batch of outstanding young cadres to act as secretaries of party committee in poverty-stricken villages for local poverty reduction. The provincial government issued direct investment of 145 million Yuan (including value of materials) for fixed-point poverty alleviation and the city and county government provided matching funds were 103 million Yuan. Secondly, it coordinated and organized 13 central state organs, enterprises and institutions and 35 units in Anhui to provide counterpart assistance for 18 key counties, sent ten division-level cadres and four section-level cadres to support the poverty reduction. The aiding units invested a total of 12 million Yuan in kind and cash, introduced about 150 million Yuan of funds, held 20 training classes, organized labor export for 800 people and helped 900 poor students. Thirdly, it implemented the care package project together with China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation and raised capital of 1.9226 million Yuan.

　　【Pilot projects of mutual funds】In 2010, the province made steady progress in the construction of pilot projects for mutual funds in poverty-stricken villages, set up 1972 mutual aid societies in 1,770 administrative villages; A total of 103,727 rural households participated in the mutual aid societies, of which 38192 were poor, and the total mutual funds amounted to 156.523 million Yuan. A total of 186.489 million Yuan of loans were issued to 53,488 rural households, including 22,029 poor households.

　　【Promote the development of old revolutionary base areas】 In 2010, the province constructed two poor old revolutionary base areas with central lottery public welfare funds of 42.5 million Yuan, determined 30 project villages in Jinzhai and Taihu County, developed the project planning and implementation plan, successfully passed the examination, inspection and verification and got approved.

　　【County-based pilot projects of contiguous development】 In 2010, pilot projects of contiguous development were launched in Lixin, Qianshan, Jing County and Funan. Based on the construction way of national pilot projects, the provincial issued special funds to implement provincial pilot projects of contiguous development in Jin’an District and Jixi County.

　　【Poverty reduction program】 Based on the extensive survey and in-depth research on the “poverty line”, “full coverage of poverty alleviation and development” and “innovation of anti-poverty work mechanism” in the northern area of Anhui, Dabie Mountain area and the floodplain along the Huai River, the government developed the “Outline for Rural Poverty Alleviation and Development of Anhui Province in the ‘12th Five-Year Plan’ Period” (draft).

　　【Pro-poor measures】  1. Continue to implement the spirit of the documents issued by the Provincial Party Committee and Government to promote poverty alleviation and development. According to the requirements of the “Opinions of Anhui Provincial Party Committee and Anhui Provincial Government on Further Strengthening Poverty Alleviation and Development” (Wan Fa [2009] No. 21), it continued to promote the full coverage of poverty alleviation and development work in Anhui Province and strived to implement pro-poor policies for all rural low-income people. It mainly implemented the "552" poverty alleviation action plan, clarified the objectives and tasks and, taking it as an important task to increase the income of farmers and reduce poverty-stricken people, strived to lift 400,000 people out of poverty within one year.

2. Strengthen organization and leadership to implement poverty reduction responsibility. In accordance with the requirements of "overall responsibility taken by t provincial government, specific work done by county government and poverty alleviation to villages and households", it practiced the party and government leader responsibility system, implemented the assessment measures on the party and government leader responsibility system in poverty alleviation and development in key counties (districts), included the results of poverty alleviation and development into the assessment of the performance of cadres and made records to provide reference for cadre appointment; the city and county government established poverty alleviation leadership and agencies, and strengthened the construction of poverty alleviation agencies in key counties (districts) for poverty alleviation and development to improve the work; the city and non-key counties (cities, districts) set up poverty alleviation and development agencies or appointed a department to take in charge of the poverty alleviation and development. Meanwhile, it gave full play to the organizing, leading and coordinating role of the leading groups for poverty alleviation and development at all levels, demanded relevant departments to fulfill their duties in poverty reduction; provided relevant treatment for cadres and continued to implement the "Implementation Opinions of Anhui Provincial Party Committee and Anhui Provincial Government on Implementing the ‘Decision of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council on Further Strengthening Poverty Alleviation and Development’ " (Wan Fa [1999] No. 17) for the treatment of the party and government leaders in key counties.

3. Improve three mechanisms to strengthen poverty alleviation and development. First, poverty relief responsibility mechanism. Based on the "Implementation of the Planning for Division of Labor of the ‘Opinions of Anhui Provincial Party Committee and Anhui Provincial Government on Further Strengthening Poverty Alleviation and Development’ ", it practiced the party and government leadership responsibility assessment system for poverty alleviation and development in key counties (districts) and the quantization assessment system for annual poverty relief responsibility implementation of various sectors and departments, initially established the evaluation system for comprehensive assessment of anti-poverty effects and gradually set up the industrial poverty alleviation responsibility system. Second, long-term mechanism for supervision of anti-poverty funds. It further improved the supervision mechanism for the use of funds in the process of declaration, implementation, supervision and acceptance of anti-poverty funds. Third, the mechanism to identify objects of poverty reduction. Based on the pilot projects for effective convergence of two systems and the principle of “size deciding by poverty monitoring and object identifying by villagers”, it established the mechanism featured “individual application, villager discussion, township verification and county approval” to identify objects of poverty reduction.

4. Continue to improve the "USB flash disk working method" to enhance the efficiency of anti-poverty work. USB flash disk, with large capacity, is light, reliable and portable and helps improve work efficiency. In 2010, as for the use of USB flash disk, the government demanded relevant departments to further improve data collection, collation and entry work and pay attention to disk data updates and security as well as the improvement of supervision methods.