Poverty Alleviation and Development in Hunan Province

　　【Overview】 2010 is the last year for the implementation of the "Outline for Poverty Alleviation and Development of China's Rural Areas (2001-2010)". Through joint efforts of all circles of society, Hunan Province successfully completed the scheduled task for 2010. The rural per capita net income of 20 key counties for national poverty alleviation and development reached 2638 Yuan, up 10.28%. The counties for poverty reduction and the reference counties both witnessed rapid economic development and great changes took place to the appearance of poor villages. The poverty alleviation and development work of Hunan Province was fully affirmed by LGOP and Ministry of Finance. In the performance evaluation of financial anti-poverty funds, Hunan received Grade A, ranking second in the county and first among the central and eastern provinces.

　　【Investment of anti-poverty funds】 In 2010, Hunan Province invested a total of 1.4 billion Yuan of poverty relief funds and 1.14 billion Yuan of financial-anti-poverty funds, of which 870 million Yuan was from the central government, 190 million Yuan from the provincial government, 83.8 million Yuan from city (prefecture) and county government. The industrial poverty relief funds amounted to 190 million Yuan. The units directly under the central government invested 81.01 million Yuan of anti-poverty funds for fixed-pointed poverty reduction, including 75.91 million Yuan in cash and 5.1 million Yuan in kind. 46 units directly under the provincial government issued 90.5 million Yuan of anti-poverty funds for village construction and the units directly under city or county government invested 61.118 million Yuan. The troops in Hunan Province put in 21 million Yuan of anti-poverty funds and social forces invested 68.305 million Yuan. China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation invested 3.21 million Yuan, of which 50,000 Yuan was in cash and 3.16 million Yuan in kind; and foreign capital of 65.095 million Yuan was issued, of which 58.08 million Yuan was yen loans and 7.018 million Yuan was in Deutsche mark.

　　【Skills training】 In 2010, the province achieved the transition “training focus, training methods, capital allocation and management mechanism”, helped 17,600 children from needy families complete vocational education, trained 1,440 backbone technicians for villages and 1,020 village heads, and organized rural practical skills trainings for more than 500,000 person-times. The training mechanism has been further improved.

　　【County-based pilot projects of contiguous development】In 2010, the province launched county-based pilot projects of entire village advancement and contiguous development through integration of funds in Yuanling, Pingjiang, Guzhang, Yongshun and Baojing. The annual central financial anti-poverty funds for each pilot county is 5 million Yuan and 102 million Yuan of funds will be integrated to support the development of local tea and oil tea industry. With good resources, policy advantage and technology advantage, the industrial developed well. 120 villages in Anhui, Sangzhi, Xinhua and Huayuan were added as pilot villages for mutual funds, and 30 poor villages in 15 provincial key (reference) counties including Chaling and Shimen were selected as pilot villages for provincial mutual funds.

　　【Poverty alleviation by credit loans】 Based on the implementation of development strategy of Xiangxi, Hunan Province increased poverty relief loan interest subsidy. In 2010, the government arranged financial poverty relief loan interest subsidy of 46.9 million Yuan, of which 33.1 million Yuan was for project loan discount and 13.8 million Yuan for rural household loan discount; issued a total of 1.2 billion Yuan of poverty relief credit loans, of which 930 million Yuan was project loans and 280 million Yuan was petty loans for households. The industrial scale in poor areas was expanded and the agricultural leading enterprises and poor farmers in impoverished regions witnessed rapid development.

　　【Poverty alleviation projects】 The central and provincial financial anti-poverty funds were mainly used for infrastructure construction, industrial development, labor skills trainings and the convergence of two systems in poor areas. The province launched 2,855 projects in 14 cities (prefectures), 44 national key (reference) counties and 68 counties with provincial key villages for poverty alleviation.

1. Anti-poverty industrial development projects. In 2010, the province invested 196 million Yuan of financial anti-poverty funds, of which 123 million Yuan was for farming and breeding projects of rural households, developed plantation area of 852,000 mu, including forestry, medicinal material planting, grassland, etc, bred 344,000 head of livestock and poultries; and issued 30 million Yuan to support the Xiangxi-based construction of leading enterprises and support more than 100 leading enterprises to develop industrial base of 340,000 mu and breed 240,000 head of livestock.

2. Poverty relief training projects. The government issued 54.6 million Yuan of financial anti-poverty funds, of which 39.45 million Yuan was labor skills training funds for 22,000 poor farmers, 15.15 million Yuan was for practical skills training of 500,000 farmers, and 2 million Yuan was for technology promotion and demonstration of improved seeds of 3.45 million mu.

3. Infrastructure construction projects. With 169.5 million Yuan of financial anti-poverty funds, the province built highroads for 478 villages, built and improved village highroads of more than 6,000 kilometers, provided electricity for 69 villages, added and innovated transmission lines of 2,600 kilometers, addressed the drinking water problem of 550,000 people, increased basic farmland of 80,000 mu, addressed the housing problem of 25,000 households, increased house area of 2 million square meters; built 35,000 biogas digesters and more than 24,000 energy conservation ovens and relocated more than 6,300 people in poverty reduction. The production and living conditions and ecological environment of impoverished villages have been further improved.

4. Effective convergence of two systems and other projects. The province invested 275.825 million Yuan of financial anti-poverty funds to actively support data filing of the poor in impoverished regions, support production and promote the development of telecom, TV, network and education industry in poverty-stricken areas.

　　【Pro-poor policy support】 On December 7, 2010, Vice Secretary of Hunan Provincial Party Committee and Provincial Governor Xu Shousheng and the leaders of relevant provincial departments to report to LGOP their work and apply for LGOP’s support for the adjustment of key counties for poverty alleviation and development, the coverage of contiguous development in the areas with special difficulties and the investment of financial anti-poverty funds. Vice Governor Xu Minghua reported twice to LGOP on Hunan’s poverty relief work. The Provincial Poverty Alleviation Office successively headed relevant persons to report to LGOP on Hunan’s poverty relief work for closer policy convergence with LGOP, Ministry of Finance and other relevant ministries and commissions. As a result, the annual anti-poverty funds issued by the central government for Hunan Province grew by nearly 14%, Wuling Mountain area and Luoxiao Mountain area were listed among the regions for contiguous development, laying a foundation for creating a new situation of poverty alleviation and development in Hunan. Meanwhile, we actively reported to the provincial Party Committee and Government on our work so that the government leaders would attach more importance to the work and provide stronger support. In addition, we strengthened the communications with the provincial financial department and the Provincial Development and Reform Commission for sectoral support. Former Secretary of Hunan Provincial Party Committee and Secretary-General of the Provincial Party Committee Yang Taibo and Assistant Governor Li Youzhi paid a special visit to the Provincial Poverty Alleviation Office for survey and Secretary of Hunan Provincial Party Committee Zhou Qiang also gave instructions on poverty reduction many times.

　　【Convergence of two systems】 In February 2010, the summing-up meeting for pilot work of effective convergence of two systems was held in Shaoyang City of Hunan Province. LGOP Director-General Fan Xiaojian affirmed the effective convergence of two systems in Hunan Province. Shaoyang is one of the first batch of national pilot counties and its experience in the pilot work was promoted nationwide. After the meeting, Shaoyang’s experienced was practiced in 44 key counties and one other county and breakthrough was made in the convergence of two systems of Hunan Province. 45 counties made records of more than 1 million objects of poverty reduction and the province arranged financial anti-poverty funds of 260 million Yuan to directly help 609,000 people. Hunan Provincial Poverty Alleviation Office successively held four trainings, carried out project examination and inspection in different regions and created Hunan’s characteristics in team building, object recognition, institution building, household supporting and advocacy. The practices and experience are good references for other provinces and relevant representatives delivered speeches on the national training on effective convergence of two systems and national poverty alleviation and development work conference.

　　【Development of poverty alleviation planning】 Hunan Provincial Poverty Alleviation Office coordinated the Provincial Department of Finance, Provincial Development and Reform Commission, the Provincial Ethnic Affairs Commission and the Provincial Department of Civil Affairs to develop the "Planning for Eradication of Poverty and Building a Moderately Prosperous Society in Hunan Province in the ‘12th Five-Year Plan’ Period"; developed the "Planning for Off-site Relocation in Hunan Province in the ‘12th Five-Year Plan’ Period" jointly with the Provincial Development and Reform Commission, and launched the "Program for Contiguous Development in Wuling Mountain Area of Hunan Province" and the "Program for Entire Village Advancement of Hunan in the ‘12th Five-Year Plan’ Period".

　　【Management of anti-poverty funds】 Hunan Province further improved the poverty relief fund allocation method of "base number + factors". Adhering to the principle of "appropriate balance, guarantee special funds, highlighting key points, fairness and openness", it made scientific arrangement and achieved early allocation of anti-poverty funds, early notice of project plan and issuance of funds three months earlier than previous years. Meanwhile, based on the inspection of the use of agriculture-benefiting funds in Hunan Province, we further strengthened the capital project management, held special work conference on poverty alleviation, issued the "Notice on the Issuance of the ‘Implementation Plan for Special Inspection of Poverty Alleviation Offices on Financial Anti-poverty Funds", made overall arrangements for the inspection work, organized relevant cities, prefectures and counties to carry out self-examination and self-correction on the use of 2007-2009 financial poverty relief funds and organized the inspection team to carry out supervision on the self-examinations of various cities and counties. According to the inspection results, the overall operation of anti-poverty funds was good in Hunan Province. The "Provincial Special Inspection Briefing" reported twice the work of the Provincial Poverty Alleviation Office and praised it on the summing-up meeting of special inspection.

　　【Social poverty alleviation】  1. Increase efforts on industrial poverty alleviation. Member units of the Provincial Leading Group for Poverty Alleviation and Development gave more priority to impoverished areas in policy support, funding and project implementation after the work conference on the development of Xiangxi, which greatly promoted the economic development of poor areas.

2. Constantly strengthen fixed-point poverty alleviation. China Ocean Shipping (Group) Company and Orient Asset Group entered Yuanling, Anhua and Shaoyang in March for fixed-point poverty alleviation. A total of 12 units directly under the central government were designated to provide counterpart support for 17 national key counties for poverty alleviation and development in Hunan. Six cities in the province designated to support six counties in Xiangxi increased their efforts. Hunan Province sent 12,252 cadres to form 3,708 working team for poverty alleviation in villages, which greatly promoted the completion of the third round of entire village advancement in poor villages.

3. More diverse social forces for poverty reduction. The Advisory Committee for Poverty Reduction of Hunan Province was formally established, the former Vice Secretary of Hunan Provincial Party Committee Xie Kangsheng acted as the director and the office is in the Provincial Poverty Alleviation Office. “2111 Project” of troops in Hunan was officially launched; the province carried out the activity of mailing postal parcels to show care and donation activity for disaster relief of Yushu; participated in the third candidate recommendation for eradication of poverty in China, and carried out the “project of home appliance going to the countryside for poverty reduction” jointly with "Shuanglu" and "Shangling". New progress was made in the implementation of foreign-funded poverty alleviation projects. Now, 90% of the Japanese-funded projects have been completed and put into use, which brought considerable economic and social benefits; and the Germany-funded projects have been implemented. The government also strengthened support for other poor villages covered by poverty reduction.

　　【Poverty alleviation institutions and the construction of cadre team】 In 2010, based on the general idea of "party building based on business and for business development", the province strengthened construction of organs.

1. Good results in Activities of Excelling in Performance. Established the Leading Group of Provincial Poverty Alleviation Office for Activities of Excelling in Performance, set up the office, developed detailed activity implementation plan, assigned the targets and tasks for 2010 to party branches and combined the Activities of Excelling in Performance with the public commitment of party members. Party members and cadres fulfilled commitment and promoted the implementation of work.

2. New progress in internal construction of organs. Focused on comprehensive and propaganda work, revised the "Government Information Network for Poverty Alleviation and Development in Hunan Province" and "Briefing on Poverty Alleviation and Development in Hunan Province". In 2010, the government compiled 13 "briefings" and issued 730 pieces of information on the Website, 8 of which was forwarded by LGOP Website and 11 were forwarded by the poverty alleviation websites of other provinces. In 2010, it had 16 articles printed in provincial media. Meanwhile, the province focused on logistics support for relevant institutions. In 2010, relevant ministries, provinces and municipalities carried out many field research activities in Hunan, there was a growing number of institution staffs and increasingly heavy work task, so the government had a heavy burden of office expenses. While striving for financial support, it strengthened management, made scientific budget and strived to save money to ensure the normal operation of institutions. Meanwhile, it strengthened comprehensive governance and confidential file management and was titled by relevant provincial department Advanced Unit for Comprehensive Governance, Advanced Individual, and Advanced Individual for File Management.

3. Further strengthen the construction of an honest and clean government. The province further regulated the exercise of power and developed the "Implementation Plan for the Establishment of Power Operating System" to sort out and study institutions’ internal executive power, administrative functions and classification of functions, which improved the internal control mechanism of institutions; we continued to study the "Rules for Building a Clean and Honest Government" and, combined with the "52 prohibitions", strengthened budget rectification, special governance of "small treasuries", "look back" and "5 + X" special inspection activities, etc., which further enhanced the ability of party members and cadres to resist corruption.

4. Strengthen performance evaluation. We organized poverty alleviation departments to carry out assessment activity for advanced units and the activity of excelling in performance. Through city (prefecture) recommendation and democratic evaluation, 20 organs in poverty reduction field were titled as Advanced Units, including three city (prefecture) poverty alleviation offices, 13 national and provincial key (reference) counties for poverty alleviation and 4 other counties.

5. New progress in institution and cadre team building. With reference to the institutional setting of LGOP, we strengthened internal organ adjustment, adjusted the names and functions of divisions and straightened out the relation with various divisions of LGOP for counterpart support. Meanwhile, we adjusted the staffs of Hunan Provincial Poverty Alleviation Office, further clarified the job responsibilities and improved work efficiency; standardized and innovated cadre selection and appointment mechanisms and the personnel changes in 2010 involved 15 people in total, including one transferred section chief, two promoted assistance researchers, four deputy section chiefs, four deputy director-level senior staffs and three new party members. It further mobilized the initiative and creativity of all staffs.