Chapter 1　China's Historic Achievements in Poverty Reduction

Introduction: The Communist Party of China (CPC) highly emphasizes its development-oriented poverty eradication programs. The establishment of the People's Republic of China (PRC), along with its socialist system, created the institutional foundation for poverty reduction and alleviation. Since the policy of reform and opening-up was introduced, China has achieved rapid, stable and continued economic growth, while implementing well-organized, planned and large-scale poverty eradication measures to lift more than 700 million people out of poverty, thus contributing greatly to global poverty reduction. Since the 18th National Congress of CPC, China has entered a new stage of poverty alleviation. Under the guidance of President Xi Jinping's poverty-eradication ideas, China has launched a lofty campaign in the fight against poverty, and made remarkable, internationally recognized achievements, adding Chinese wisdom and strategies to the world's poverty reduction formula.

Since its inception, the CPC has been pursuing the mission of seeking happiness for the people and rejuvenation for the Chinese nation. After the founding of the PRC, the CPC has put wholeheartedly serving the people at the heart of its ruling philosophy and purpose. The socialist system in China lays the institutional foundation for poverty reduction. Since the initiation of reform and opening-up, particularly since the mid-1980s, the Chinese government has launched well-organized, planned and large-scale poverty eradication programs, and introduced and implemented the Seven-Year Program for Lifting 80 Million People Out of Poverty (1994-2000), the Outline for Development-Oriented Poverty Alleviation in Rural China (2001-2010), and the 2011 Outline for Development-Oriented Poverty Alleviation in Rural China (2011-2020). In just over 30 years, the PRC has succeeded in lifting as many people out of poverty as those the entire Western world of 38 countries have lifted in the course of modernization in the past three centuries. China has met the subsistence needs of 1.3 billion people, lifted over 800 million people out of poverty, and provided employment for 770 million people by creating the world's largest educational system and social security network.

Since the 18th National Congress of CPC, the CPC Central Committee led by General Secretary Xi Jinping has incorporated poverty reduction into China's overall approach to building socialism with Chinese characteristics, that is, to promote coordinated progress in economic, political, cultural, social and ecological areas, and the Four-Pronged Comprehensive Strategy (comprehensively build a moderately prosperous society, comprehensively deepen reform, comprehensively implement the rule of law, and comprehensively strengthen Party discipline). The Party has treated poverty eradication as the most basic mission and iconic indicator of achieving a moderately prosperous society, and started an all-out fight against poverty nationwide. As such, China has entered the crucial stage of poverty reduction in a new era. Since the 18th National Congress of CPC, the country has made decisive progress in the fight against poverty: an annual average of more than 13 million people – that is, a total of over 68 million people for the past five years – have got rid of poverty, a success unparalleled in China's history of poverty alleviation. Over the last five years, comprehensive reform efforts have been made, with over 1,500 reform measures being adopted one after another that have caused fundamental changes to the Party's common practice as well as the political and social atmosphere. It is just a matter of time that we will gain a full victory in the fight against poverty.

China realized the UN Millennium Development Goal of halving the impoverished population in 2005, ten years ahead of time. We are committed to eliminating extreme poverty by 2020 to, once again, achieve the 2030 UN Agenda for Sustainable Development a decade ahead of time. China will continue to contribute to poverty reduction worldwide, lead by example, and offer Chinese wisdom and approach to the exploration of a new global cooperative poverty reduction scheme.