Realizing targeted poverty alleviation in China: People’s voices, implementation challenges and policy implications

Abstract

Purpose

The Chinese Government initiates the targeted poverty alleviation strategy to lift 70.17 million population out of poverty in five years time until 2020. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how the targeted poverty alleviation policy was implemented. The investigation focusses on the people’s voices, implementation challenges and implications for policy making and improvement.

Design/methodology/approach

A nationwide survey covering 2,075 households in 22 impoverished counties of 13 provinces was carried out in August, 2015, providing rich statistics and evidence for the paper. Literature review of China’s poverty alleviation history is also made to lay a research basis for the study.

Findings

There are diverse needs of the impoverished households of different ages and different poverty causes. The defects of the policy are revealed such as the impractical way of accurate poverty identification, the existence of poverty-returning problem and passive poverty alleviation.

Originality/value

The study of the paper investigates the current challenges for carrying out the targeted poverty alleviation and indicates implications for policy improvement. These contribute to the effectiveness and efficiency of the targeted poverty alleviation policy in China.

Citation

Li, Y., Su, B. and Liu, Y. (2016), "Realizing targeted poverty alleviation in China: People’s voices, implementation challenges and policy implications", China Agricultural Economic Review, Vol. 8 No. 3, pp. 443-454. https://doi.org/10.1108/CAER-11-2015-0157