A formerly impoverished county is sowing the seeds of success. Cui Jia and Zhu Zhe report from Huichang, Jiangxi.

Li Fashun, a farmer in Huichang county, Jiangxi province, said people often talk about poverty alleviation－a key task for the central government－but they rarely know how it feels to live in such conditions.

The experience is something Li knew only too well at one time in his life. "I used to get up every morning feeling hopeless. No matter how hard I tried, I was in debt and had no income," said the 44-year-old, who grows navel oranges in mountainous Nantian village.

"Worst of all, I lost the motivation to change things around because there was no hope. That's what poverty does to you." He and his wife worked hard to take care of their orange groves and provide for the family. All went well until Li's father was diagnosed with throat cancer in 2012 and needed full-time care.

It meant Li was unable to manage his farm－an essential task to ensure a good harvest－and the high cost of treatment almost immediately ate up the family's savings. Without a stable income, the family quickly fell into deep debt.

Li borrowed 120,000 yuan from relatives and friends to pay for his father's expensive medication and his daughter's university tuition, but he became increasingly frustrated when he needed to borrow more money. "It felt like I was being sucked into a black hole. There was no hope of getting out of poverty, no matter how hard I tried," he recalled.

When the central government rolled out an ambitious plan in 2013 aimed at eradicating poverty nationwide by the end of this year, about 15 percent of Huichang's 511,600 residents were living below the poverty line.

Measures

Surrounded by mountains, Huichang had been on the list of national-level poverty-stricken counties since 1986, when the government first established bodies at all levels to tackle the problem.

Like many rural areas, poor transportation infrastructure and a lack of cultivable farmland constrained Huichang's economic development. What's more, limited resources and opportunities meant people often found it difficult to raise their living standards.

A number of problems led Huichang's population into poverty. In 2013, more than 40 percent of its impoverished residents had serious illnesses or were supporting family members who were ill.

Also, some didn't have enough farmland to support their families, while others didn't want to make the effort to turn their lives around, said Li Weiming, director of the county's poverty alleviation office.

"Previous poverty alleviation projects were more about boosting the local economy in general, but the 2013 plan was people-oriented. Every individual who needs help has a tailor-made plan based on their circumstances to ensure they can get out of poverty," he said.

The Nantian village committee opened a file on every poverty-stricken resident, detailing the causes of their situation and the support policies available to remedy it.

Like villages in Huichang and elsewhere in China, the files are printed out and hung on the wall of village committee offices to constantly remind officials of their most important task.

Every time a villager's income rises above the poverty line and his or her condition surpasses national assessment standards, the officials stick a label saying "out of poverty" on the file. At the same time, the person's status is amended in the national poverty alleviation database.

As more labels appear on the walls of committee offices countrywide, China's progress in poverty alleviation becomes increasingly obvious.

The number of impoverished people nationwide fell to 5.51 million at the end of last year, from nearly 100 million at the end of 2012. 

Li Weiming said: "Income is not the sole target when it comes to poverty alleviation assessment. If villagers don't have access to schooling, healthcare, safe housing and clean drinking water, they cannot be crossed off the list of impoverished people, even if their annual income is above the poverty line."

In 2010, that line was defined as annual per capita income of 2,300 yuan. The figure is adjusted annually for inflation, and last year, it was 3,747 yuan ($528). In 2015, Li Fashun stopped worrying about the medical bills because his father became eligible for government-funded commercial health insurance for the impoverished rural population, which paid 90 percent of the treatment costs.

As his father's condition improved, Li Fashun was able to devote more time to his orange groves. The improvements didn't stop there, though, because he spotted a new opportunity.

In 2016, he applied for an interest-free loan designed to help people living in poverty start small businesses. He used the 80,000 yuan he received to join a cooperative established by local orange growers.

Together, they founded an online store to sell the fruit, and saw business boom.

Li Fashun paid off the loan in three years and started saving to clear his other debts.Last year, an "out of poverty" label was put on his file. "Whatever you want to do to get out of poverty, there is support available. All I needed was to be ambitious," he said.

Delisting

By December, only 778 people in Huichang were still living in poverty, a marked decline from the 80,000-plus recorded in 2013. Huichang was taken off the list of national-level poverty-stricken counties on April 28 last year.

The challenge ahead is to ensure that people are capable of standing on their own feet. Preventing them from slipping back into poverty is as important as getting them out of it, Li Weiming said.To create stable work and business opportunities, the county has ploughed poverty alleviation funds into the construction of small industrial parks located near villages and also used preferential policies to attract labor-intensive businesses.

Since 2007, the Huichang authorities have encouraged villagers to plant navel oranges and tangelos, which have higher added value. Thanks to the unpolluted environment and clean water, the high-quality fruits have become increasingly popular.

Since navel oranges and tangelos can only be harvested once a year, the authorities decided to support development of another agricultural product－baby pumpkins.

After successful trials, many villagers became involved in the business last year. The move was aimed at offering villagers more opportunities to raise their incomes and help them stay out of poverty.With the right businesses, people can make more money in rural areas than in cities, according to Wu Tao, deputy head of Mazhou township.

"People have started to change their perception of villages. I believe many young villagers who are currently migrant workers will return after seeing the opportunities available," Wu said.

So, in addition to supporting poverty alleviation, new endeavors such as baby pumpkins are playing an important role in revitalizing rural China, which is the next step for the world's most-populous country to wipe out absolute poverty by the end of the year.

At the March 6 symposium, Xi said the current poverty alleviation measures will stay in place as the focus shifts to the revitalization of rural areas.

He said the country will also accelerate implementation of a mechanism to prevent people from slipping back into poverty.

Getting out of poverty is not the end, but the starting point of a new life, he added.

After people discovered ways of making life better, village infrastructure, such as roads and garbage disposal systems, were also significantly improved as part of the poverty alleviation project. Even the renovation of bathrooms in people's homes has become a key project.

"Now, the villagers can have quality lives in rural areas just like in the cities, but without the pollution," Zeng Jianming, Party chief of Zengfeng village, said.

Zeng was speaking in the local ancestors' hall, where a couple of old photos of the village were hanging on the wall. The dirty adobe houses captured in the photos have been replaced by white-painted brick ones and the dirt road has been widened and sealed with tarmac.

"Those photos were only taken in 2013, but they seem a century old, considering how the village looks now," Zeng said.

"When people talked about rural China in the past, they often pictured poverty and a dirty environment. Well, those things are history now.

"Like many of his peers, Li Fashun's navel orange business has been seriously affected by the novel coronavirus outbreak.

"As the logistics system across the country was halted temporarily, orange sales almost stopped. It was very worrying," he said.

After the logistics chains gradually resumed work, the villagers had no choice but to sell the oranges at below cost price before they rotted in the warehouses. Fortunately, the outbreak has had little impact on most farming activities, which have continued as normal, he added.

At the March 6 symposium, Xi urged officials nationwide to overcome the difficulties posed by the coronavirus outbreak and strive to meet poverty elimination goals by using poverty reduction funds and loans to help migrant workers return to their jobs and also to help farmers sell their produce.

Li Fashun now sees himself as a rural entrepreneur, and is sure he can handle the challenges posed by the outbreak."The government has given me a push on the way out of poverty. Now, it's down to me to make my life better, despite the difficulties that lie ahead," he said.