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Nations & States - Global Policy Forum UN Says Graft Foils Eradication of Poverty
South China Morning Post / Reuters
April 7, 2000
Corruption remains the biggest hurdle to wiping out poverty in rural China, even though the world's most populous country has cut the number of poor people to 32 million, a senior UN official said on Friday. ''Corruption is the major stumbling block to successful poverty eradication,'' said the resident representative in China of the United Nations Development Programme, Kerstin Leitner.
UN officials said the number of poor people in the mainland dropped to 32 million in 1999 from 42 million the previous year. The United Nations puts its poverty level at income of less than 640 yuan (HK$601.24) a year. ''There are also other definitions [of poverty]. The World Bank uses US$1 a day, and if you use that, then the poor in China is over 100 million,'' Ms Leitner's deputy, Lena Lindberg, said.
A UN report released on Tuesday said nearly half of the world's six billion people live on less than US$2 a day and about 1.2 billion, or 22 per cent, barely survive on US$1 a day, including 500 million in South Asia and 300 million in Africa.
Ms Leitner said China's drive to stamp out corruption would help lift more people out of poverty. ''In the most recent session of the NPC [National People's Congress], it became very clear that the government is committed to tackling the problem of corruption in China,'' she said.
During the annual meeting of the NPC - the mainland's parliament - in March, Premier Zhu Rongji vowed to intensify a crackdown on smuggling and punish corrupt customs officials. On Saturday, state media published a January speech by President Jiang Zemin railing against official corruption and swearing to punish anyone caught, no matter how high-ranking they were.
Ms Lindberg said the mainland government set aside 25 billion yuan in 1999 for its poverty programme, and some of this money was channelled into the Agricultural Bank of China, which helps cash-strapped households. UN officials lauded the move, saying the mainland's previous mistake was to allocate funds to inefficient state-owned firms in poor areas, which wasted money, rather than to needy households.
Ms Lindberg said it was difficult to evaluate the impact on poverty of the mainland's membership of the World Trade Organisation, which Beijing expects to join this year. ''That definitely contributes to additional economic growth of the whole country and that will give poor people opportunities,'' she said. ''However, when cheap products come in from other countries and they compete with cheap products produced by these poor people, they might not be able to sell their products,'' she said.
The government has also promised to reduce poverty and develop poorer western regions, which Ms Lindberg said should help reduce disparities between them and the rapidly developing coastal region.
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