1. basic information
mizhi county in yulin city, shaanxi province, is an extremely poor region in the lvliang mountain, a state-level revolutionary base and a key poverty-alleviation area. with a highly fragile eco-system, its land of 1,212 square kilometers on the hilly loess plateau is plagued by grim water loss and soil erosion. under its jurisdiction are eight towns, 206 administrative villages, one sub-district, and five urban communities. it has a population of 223,000, of which 168,000, or 75.3 percent, are farmers. in 2017, its gdp was 4.8 billion yuan, and its per capita gdp only 21,400 yuan, about 35.9 percent of the national average. by the end of 2017, 82 villages and 17,869 residents of 7,356 households in the county were registered as impoverished. as such, the poverty headcount ratio stood at 9.8 percent.
mizhi plans to lift all of its people out of poverty by the end of 2018.
2. poverty alleviation efforts in recent years
the group company rolled out a targeted poverty alleviation program in the county in 2002, which was undertaken by shendong coal group. an employee from the company was selected to work in mizhi as deputy county magistrate (temporary post).
in terms of industrial poverty alleviation, to boost the growth of feature agricultural business, the company helped the county build 22 sheep breeding bases, two cow breeding bases, six chicken breeding bases, eight exemplary standardized pig farms, and 50 standardized greenhouses. in the field of infrastructure, the company assisted the county in the construction of roads and bridges, land management, installation of solar street lamps, and construction of headquarters of villagers鈥?committees. it also forked out 780,000 yuan to buy dust-free writing boards for every classroom in the primary and middle schools across the county and to subsidize nine families whose members suffer severe illness.
