Xi expounds on Chinese approach to eliminating absolute poverty

BEIJING -- President Xi Jinping on Thursday said China has adopted a series of extraordinary policies and measures, blazing a poverty reduction path and forming an anti-poverty theory with Chinese characteristics.

Xi, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, made the remarks while addressing a gathering marking the country's accomplishments in poverty eradication and commending role models in that cause.

Summing up the experience, Xi said the leadership of the CPC has provided a solid political and organizational guarantee for China's poverty alleviation efforts.

The anti-poverty campaign was put under the unified and centralized leadership of the CPC Central Committee.

A total of 255,000 teams were dispatched to offer on-the-ground support and over 3 million people were sent to the countryside as special commissioners for poverty relief.

"As long as we adhere to the Party's leadership, we can surely defeat any difficulties on our march forward," Xi said.

He said China upholds a people-centered philosophy of development and unswervingly pursues prosperity for all, emphasizing that ending poverty, improving people's well-being and realizing common prosperity are the essential requirements of socialism.

The country has invested nearly 1.6 trillion yuan (about $246 billion) of fiscal funds into poverty alleviation over the past eight years.

China leverages the political advantages of the country's socialist system which can bring together the resources necessary to accomplish great tasks, thus generating solidarity and joint actions for poverty eradication, said Xi. The whole nation was mobilized to pool strength in the fight against poverty.

China has also adopted a targeted poverty alleviation strategy and strives to eradicate poverty through development, said Xi.

From household to household, the questions of who needs help, who should provide help, how help should be rendered, and what standards and procedures should be adopted for eliminating poverty were answered.

Xi said the country has stimulated the creativity of impoverished residents, who took the initiative to get rid of poverty.

Xi said China's poverty alleviation drive has fostered an atmosphere in which the whole society helps those in need and applied a realistic and pragmatic approach.

The important experience constitutes the latest achievement in adapting Marxism's anti-poverty theory to Chinese conditions, he said.

China has cultivated the spirit of poverty alleviation, which is an amalgamation of patriotism, collectivism and socialism.

Xi said shaking off poverty is not the finish line, but the starting point of a new life and new endeavor, and urged efforts to effectively consolidate the achievements in poverty alleviation and rural vitalization.