Firms find role in battle against poverty

▶ Industries created, upgraded and transformed during nation’s campaign

Chinese President Xi Jinping on Thursday presented medals, certificates and plaques to 1,982 personnel and 1,501 collectives as China’s model poverty fighters, of which more than 500 recipients were enterprises and representatives of enterprises, coming from industries such as the internet, education, agriculture, energy and aviation.

“In the process of participating in poverty alleviation and rural revitalization, enterprises actually build, upgrade or transform related industries, from which they will profit,” Sun Wenhua, director of the China Agriculture Industry Chamber of Commerce at All- China Federation of Industry and Commerce, said on Thursday.

Most well- known Chinese private enterprises, like Alibaba Group, Wanda Group, Didi Chuxing and Geely, have participated in the mighty task and their work has been recognized.

Since the launch of reform and opening- up in the late 1970s in China, 770 million impoverished rural residents have escaped poverty. China accounted for more than 70 percent of global poverty reduction over the same period. The remaining 98.99 million impoverished rural residents in China were all lifted out of poverty in the past eight years.

The country has invested nearly 1.6 trillion yuan ($ 248.1 billion) of fiscal funds into poverty alleviation over the past eight years. Enterprises also invested in relevant projects to create industry clusters or boost industrial upgrading or transformation, and they provided jobs to help support the poverty battle.

Wang Yu, chairman of Shanghai- based private carrier Spring Airlines, told the Global Times on Thursday that having a stable job is the most precise way to alleviate poverty and ease generational poverty.

Wang was one of the distinguished individuals picking up honors on stage on Thursday.

E- commerce giant Suning, a private enterprise that received an award, has donated more than 2.3 billion yuan in cash and materials to targeted poverty alleviation and rural revitalization.

Another example is Danzhai Town in Southwest China’s Guizhou Province, where Wanda Group invested more than 2.3 billion yuan in a tourism town. It received 19 million tourists over a three- year period, driving the tourism income of Danzhai Town to 12 billion yuan and increasing the incomes of 58,800 poor people in the county.

“As a young technology company, Didi Chuxing is inspired to be part of the national and global endeavors to end poverty,” the car- hailing company said on Thursday.

“Many countries use charity as a substitute for poverty alleviation, but China’s poverty alleviation projects are completed through industrial transformation and upgrading promoted by enterprises, which is sustainable,” said Sun.

According to Alibaba, in the past three years, 832 statelevel poverty- stricken counties have generated more than 270 billion yuan in online sales through Alibaba’s e- commerce platform through its agricultural poverty alleviation projects.