China’s Economic Growth and Poverty Reduction

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China’s economic growth and poverty reduction (1978-2002)
By Hu Angang，Hu Linlin and Chang Zhixiao1
[Abstract] This article has summarized and evaluated the trend of China’s poverty decrease in the period of 1978-2002, considering that China has obtained great achievements in the area of poverty decrease sine 1978 and made great contributions to the world; however, poverty decrease has not corresponded to the economic growth and it has slowed down the pace since the middle of 1980s; in addition, some new forms of poverty have arisen. The following part analyzes the main reasons resulting in that phenomenon, namely the quality of the economic growth has decreased and the degree of inequality has increased. The final part puts it forward that new tactics to decrease poverty (2003-2015) should be worked out, including adjusting the national poverty line, identifying three types of poverty (income poverty, humanity poverty and knowledge poverty), attaching importance to the increase of disadvantaged groups’ opportunity to participate social activities and the fabrication of benefit expressing mechanism, and designing an effective and comprehensive anti-poverty strategic framework so as to make anti-poverty policies correspond with macro-economic policies and regional developing policies, etc.
[key words] economic growth , poverty reduction
I. The trend and evaluation of China’s poverty reduction(1978-2002)
1.1 China has made great achievements in poverty reduction
China’s economy has entered the take-off stage since 1978─the average growth rate of per capita GDP has been up to 8.1%. Just as Amartya Sen has analyzed: in the past two decades,
China’s economy has been developed very rapidly. The growth of China’s income per capita is much faster than that of any other region in the world. Nevertheless, people have always failed to realize that it is rather terrific for such a large country as China to have so rapid growth in per capita income. It’s totally different from those well-known countries or regions with rapid economic growth such as Hong Kong and Singapore. Unlike China, who has very large rural population, Hong Kong and Singapore are actually cities. It is an extraordinary achievement for such a large country with so great regional differences to obtain such a high average growth rate. 2
Meanwhile, China’s rural poverty population has decreased by a big margin. According to China’s
1 Hu Angang, Professor, Director of Center for China Study, Chinese Academy of Scinece, Tsinghua University;
Hu Linlin, Ph. D student of School of Public Policy& Management, Tsinghua University; Chang Zhixiao,
Associate Professor of School of Government, Peking University.
2 Amartya Sen: “The Conceptual Challenge of Evaluating Inequality and Poverty”, Economics (quarterly), China
Center for Economic Research, Peking University Press, 2003.1, pp. 257-258.
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national poverty line, rural poverty population has dropped from 250 million in 1978 to 28.2 million in 2002, decreasing by 88.7%. Poverty population has averagely decreased by 9.24 million per year (see table 1). According to the international poverty line, which is that cost of living per capita per day is below $1, the World Bank estimates that China’s rural poverty population has dropped from 280 million in 1990 to 124 million in 1997, decreasing by 55.7%. Poverty population has averagely decreased 22.29 million per year (see appendix 1). These different estimations demonstrate that China is the country with the largest population and has the largest poverty population, making unprecedented achievements in poverty reduction.
China’s achievements in poverty reduction make huge contributions to the cause of poverty reduction of the world. It is estimated by the World Bank that according to the international poverty line (per capita cost of living is below $1 per day), China’s poverty population dropped from 542 million to 375 million in the 1980s (referring to the period of 1980-1990), decreasing by
167 million. In the corresponding period, the poverty population of the whole world decreased by
98.3 million. China’s contributing rate to the world’s cause of poverty reduction (mainly referring to the developing area; the below is the same) is 166.9%. In the 1990s, China’s poverty population decreased by 115 million, and the contributing rate is 122.8%. It is also estimated by the World
Bank that China’s poverty population will drop to 74 million; the net decrease is 150 million, compared with that in 1999, which will account for 41.7% of the whole world’s poverty reduction.
In 1990, China’s poverty population accounted for 29% of that of the world; the number has been down to 19.2% in 1999, decreasing by approximately 10%. It is forecast that the number will be down to 9.1% in 2015. Asia is an area with the largest and most condensed poverty population.
Among the five Asian countries with the most condensed poverty population (China, India,
Pakistan, Indonesia and Bangladesh), according to the international poverty line, China’s current proportion of poverty population is the lowest. The ratio between China’s per capita GDP (PPP) and India’s per capita GDP is 1.6:1; and India’s ratio of people whose cost of living per day is less than $1 is 25.7% higher than that of China, while India’s ratio of people whose cost of living per day is less than $2 is 32.5% higher than that of China (see table 3).
The above statistics demonstrate that China has experienced a period in human history in which poverty population decreased by a largest margin in the past two decades, and reversed the trend that poverty population has been increasing in the past five decades in the world history,
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causing the poverty population of the world to decrease for the first time (see table 4). That is to say, without China’s efforts of poverty reduction, or excluding China’s poverty population, the poverty population of the world would have increased from 848 million in 1980 to 917 million in
1990 , and then to 945 million in 1999.
Table 1 The annual rural poverty reduction, the growth rate of per capita GDP and farmers’ consumption level year The annual poverty reduction announced by the government（10 thousand）a
The growth rate of per capita
GDP（％）b
The growth rate of farmers’ consumption level（％）c
The growth rate of farmers’ net income per capita（%）c 1978-1985 1786 8.3 10.0 15.1
1985-1990 800 6.2 2.5 3.0
1990-1997 500 9.9 8.0 5.0
1997－2002 436 7.7 3.4 3.8
1978－2002 924 8.1 5.6 7.2
Note: a: calculated according to the data of appendix 1; b and c: China Statistical Abstract (2002), pp. 18, pp. 32, and pp.91, all calculated by fixed price. Data sources of 2002: National Statistic Bureau: The Communiqué of China’s National Economy and Social Development, Economy Daily, March 1, 2003.
Table 2 Number of People Living on Less Than 1$ Per Day Estimated by World Bank
(million)
region 1990 年 1999 年 2015 年
East Asia and the Pacific 486（37.6%） 279(23.9%) 80(9.9%) excluding China 110(8.5%) 57(4.9%) 7(0.9%)
Europe and middle Asia 6(0.5%) 24(2.1%) 7(0.9%)
Middle East and North Africa 48(3.7%) 57(4.9%) 47(5.8%)
Latin America and Caribbean region 5(0.4%) 6(0.5%) 8(1.0%)
South Asia 506(39.2%) 488(41.7%) 264(32.6%)
Sub-Sahara Africa 241(18.7%) 315(26.9%) 404(49.9%)
Total 1292(100.0%) 1169(100.0%) 809(100.0%) excluding China 917(71.0%) 945(80.8%) 635(90.9%)
China 375（29.0%） 224(19.2%) 74(9.1%)
Note: the data in brackets are the ratio of poverty population accounting for the total population of the world.
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Source: World Bank,2003, Global Economic Prospects and the Development Countries, The World Bank,
Table 1.9
Table 3 The percentage of poverty population in several Asian countries
GDP per capita
（PPP$）
Population below national poverty line (%)
Population’s
expenditure below below $1 per day (%)
Population’s
expenditure below below
$2 per day (%)
Bangladesh 1,423（1998） 42.7(1991-92) 35.6(1995-96) 29.1(1996) 77.8(1996)
China 3,356（1998） 6.0(1996) 4.6(1998) 18.5(1998) 53.7(1998)
India 2,101（1998） 40.9(1992) 35.0(1994) 44.2(1997) 86.2(1997)
Indonesia 2,806（1998） 15.7(1996) 27.1(1999) 7.7(1999) 55.3(1999)
Pakistan 1,794（1998） 34.0(1991) 31.0(1996) 84.7(1996)
Note: the number in brackets is the time when the research was carried out
Source: World Bank, World Development Indicators 2001, The World Bank, pp.64
Table 4 Poverty population and the poverty rate of the world
(1950-1992)
1950 1960 1970 1980 1992 1999
Poverty population
(million)a
1805.6 1946.5 2200.7 2426.6 2800 2320
Population in dire poverty（million）b 1376.2 1330.1 1304.7 1390.3 1294 1169
Poverty rate（％） 71.9 64.3 60.1 55.0 51.3 38.1
Dire poverty rate（％） 54.8 44.0 35.6 31.5 23.7 13.3
Note: a refers to people whose cost of living per day is less than $2; b refers to people whose cost of living per day is less than $1.
Source: the data of 1950-1992 are quoted from Francois Bourguignom and Christian Morrisso,
2002, “Inequality among World Citizens:1820-1992”, The American Economic Review,
September, pp.727-744；the data of 1999 are quoted from World Bank, 2003, Global Economic
Prospects and the Development Countries, The World Bank, Table 1.9
1.2 Why can China decrease poverty population by a large margin?
The main reasons are as follows:
1.2.1 The continuous high economic growth is the basis of poverty reduction. The average per capita growth rate of GDP of China is 8.1% in the period of 1978-2002 (see table 1),
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which is the period lasting for the longest time with the highest growth rate of GDP per capita and the largest population who benefit from it. This corresponds to doubling per capita GDP every 8.6 years, 5.4 times of global GDP per capita growth rate in the same period (1.5%). According to the estimation made by the World Bank, it took Britain 58 years to double its per capita income
(1780-1838), America 47 years (1839-1886), Japan 34 years (1885-1919), South Korea 11 years
(1966-1977). In China, the annual growth rate of rural population’s consumption level (the majority of China’s population) is 5.6%; the annual growth rate of per capita net income of farmers is 7.2%, corresponding to doubling their per capita income every 9.7 years (see table 1), which is the major reason leading to China’s great poverty reduction in rural areas. In 1978 nearly
100% peasant household whose per capita net income was below 500 yuan; in 1985 the percentage was 77.7%; in 1990 it was 35%; and in 2001 only 2.5%. In 1985 the percentage of peasant households whose per capita net income was less than 1000 yuan is 97.69%, while in
2001 the ratio has been down to only 13.22% (see table 5), which shows that the extremely poor and the poor have been sharply decreased.
Table 5 Percentage of Rural Households Grouped by Per Capita Annual Net Income unit：％ grouping by net income 1978 1985 1990 1995 2001
Below 100 yuan 33.3 1.0 0.3 0.21
100－300 64.3 36.9 8.34 1.06
300－500 39.8 26.41 3.77
2.51
More than 500 yuan 22.3 64.95 94.96 97.49
More than 1000 yuan 2.4
2.31 22.78 69.77 86.78
Sources: the data of 1978 and 1985 are quoted from China’s Social Statistics (1990), pp. 68; the data of 1990 and
1995 are quoted from China Statistical Yearbook (2000); the data of 2001 are quoted from China Statistical
Abstract (2002), pp. 99.
1.2.2 A Great deal of rural labor force transfers to non-agricultural industries. More
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and more people are employed in village and township enterprises. The number has increased from 28.27 million in 1978 to 130.86 million in 2001, accounting for 26.7% of total rural work force, compared with the original ratio 9.2%. In addition, in 2001 38.16 million people work in private rural enterprises or are self-employed, accounting for 7.7% of total rural employees. The total of the above two ratios is 34.4%, exceeding 1/3 of total rural employed population (see figure
1).
Fig 1 Percentage of employed persons in Township and village Enterprises、Private
Enterprises and Self-employed individuals in rural area
0.00%
5.00%
10.00%
15.00%
20.00%
25.00%
30.00%
1978 1980 1985 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001
Township and village Enterprises
Private enterprises
Self-employed
Source：China statistical yearbook（2002）, pp.121
1.2.3 speeding up urbanization. China has experienced the largest population removing in the world since the policy of reform and open-up was carried out. This includes population transference, referring to moving from the place where one originally lives. In China’s case, it refers to transferring one’s household register or transforming from agricultural population to non-agricultural population, directly recruiting personnel for employment from rural areas, such as graduates of junior college, technical secondary school, demobilized servicemen, professional personnel, etc. Population flowing, refers to that the living place remains the same, but the person himself (or herself) has left the place and stridden across a given administrative region, temporarily stayed there, and engaged himself in various activities. The activity of rural labors going to cities for work belongs to the type of population flowing. In the period of 1982-2000,
206,750,000 people have moved from rural to urban areas, equal to 45.0% of total urban
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population in the same period , and 84.6% of newly-increased rural population. In the same period,
109,600,000 rural labors move to cities, equal to 45.8% of total town labor force and 94.3% of newly-increased town labor force. From the above we can see that the scales of moving population and labor force are enlarging rapidly. In the 1980s, moving population is 8,140,000 and moving labor force is 4,010,000, while in the 1990s, the number is 14,140,000 and 7,750,000 respectively.
Some are agricultural population who transform to non-agricultural population and majority others are rural laborers who go to cities for work. The wage income has become one of the most important sources of farmers’s income. The ratio of wage income accounting for their total income has been up to 30.4% in 2001 from 13.2% in 1985 (see figure 2), which shows that peasants have partly enjoyed the benefits brought by urbanization and non-agricultural industries.
Table 6 Population and labor force moving from rural areas to urban areas (1982-2000) unit：10 thousand period The increased number of urban total population The number of moving population The number of moving labor force
The average moving population per year
The average moving labor force per yea
1982－1990 8715 6510 3208 814 401
1990－1995 4979 3901 2020 780 404
1996－2000 10732 10237 5732 2030 1146
1990－2000 15711 14138 7752 1414 775
1982－2000 24426 20675 10960 1149 609
Sources: Industry and policy department of Ministry of Agriculture, quoted from Finance and
Economics, 2003, 3rd/4th issue, pp. 95; the data of total urban population are from China
Statistical Abstract, 2002, pp.34.
Fig 2 Percentage of wages income to total revenue
8
0.00%
5.00%
10.00%
15.00%
20.00%
25.00%
30.00%
35.00%
1985 1990 1995 2001
Year
sources: China Statistical Abstract, 2002, pp. 97
1.2.4 Implementing export-oriented open-up policies. China’s export volume has increased rapidly since the policy of reform and open-up has been carried out, especially the export of labor-intensive products has increased very rapidly, which plays an important role in expanding employment and poverty reduction. The export volume of 2002 is 325.6 billion dollar, increasing by 32 times than that of 1978. The proportion of export volume accounting for GDP has increased rapidly from 4.6% in 1978 to 23.0% in 2001. In addition, China draws foreign investment actively and takes an active part in economic globalization, which is also a way to large poverty reduction, especially the foreign economy in Guangdong and Zhejiang attracts large quantities of surplus agricultural labor force in different areas. The flowing labor force of Guangdong accounts for 39% of that of the whole country.
1.2.5 Human capital has been obviously improved. The level of people’s education and health condition has been greatly improved since reform, which is useful to human capital accumulation and plays an important role on improving people’s living standard and poverty reduction. As shown in table 7, average educational years of people above 15 years old has been increased to 7.11 years in 2000 from 4.64 years in 1982. The illiterate population has decreased largely, the ratio of which has decreased from 22.8% in 1982 to 6.7% in 2002; the absolutely illiterate population has decreased to 84,920,000 from 231,770,000, of which rural illiterate and semiliterate population has obviously decreased. Infant mortality rate has decreased from 37.61% in 1982 to 28.38% in 2000. The average life expectancy has increased to 71.40 years in 2000 from
67.77 years in 1981. The above demonstrates the important progress in the area of education and
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medical care, and the complementary relationship between economic and social progress. 3
Table 7 Basic status of China’s human capital (1982-2000)
1982 1990 1995 2000
Average educational years 4.64 5.52 6.09 7.11
The percentage of illiterate people in total population（%）
22.8 15.9 12.0 6.7
The percentage of illiterate and semiliterate rural people in total population（％） 27.87(1985) 20.73 13.47 8.96(1999)
Infant mortality rate（‰）
Average life expectancy(year)
37.61(1981)
67.77(1981)
32.89
68.55
33.03(1996)
70.80(1996)
28.38
71.40
Sources: China Statistical Abstract, 2002, pp. 34: the estimation of average educational years is quoted from “The Research on the Gap between Human Capital and Economic Development of
China’s Different Regions”(2001), Master’s dissertation by Li Chunbo, School of Public Policy&
Management ,Tsinghua University,.
1.2.6 Anti-poverty actions adopted by the government. China’s government made political commitment to reducing poverty in early 1980s and reflected poverty reduction goals and plans in the national economic plans. With the the development of the economy ,the central government’s willingness to aid the poor become stronger and stronger, the input of aiding is also increasing (see table 8). In order to protect the benefits of the farmers, the government adjusted agricultural policies─to increase and loosen the price of agricultural products step by step. As a result, the purchase prices of agricultural products have greatly increased in the 1980s and the middle of the
1990s. In 1996, the price index of agricultural products is 5.5 times as much as that in 1978. The average growth rate per year is 9.9%. In the corresponding period, the retail price index of rural industrial products are 2.9 times and 6.1 times respectively. The growth rate of farmers’ actual earnings per year (the price index growth rate of agricultural products minus that of industrial products) is 3.8% (see figure 3).
Table 8 The national anti-poverty fund and the ratio of that in GDP year discount loan （10 million Work instead of relieve (10 million Developing fund （ 10 million yuan） Total
（10 million yuan） The proportion of that in GDP
（%）
Per capita amount in poverty population
（yuan/each person）
3 Amartyasen, 1998, Development as Freedom, the Preface of the Chinese version, Chinese People
University Press, 2002.
10
yuan） yuan)
1986 23 9 10 42 0.41 32
1990 30 6 10 46 0.25 54
1991 35 18 10 63 0.29 67
1992 41 16 10 67 0.25 83
1993 35 30 11 76 0.22 101
1994 45 40 12 97 0.21 194
1995 45 40 13 98 0.17 151
1996 55 40 13 108 0.16 180
1997 85 40 28 153 0.21 306
1998 100 50 33 183 0.23 436
1999 150 65 43 258 0.31 756
2000 260 0.29 1182
Note: per capita amount in poverty population is calculated according to poverty population of the same year, see appendix 1.
Sources: data of 1986-1997 are from The Financial Aid to the Poor by the Central Government edited by Jiang
Yonghua and Gao Hongbin, China’s Financial Press, 1998. data of 1998-1999 are from Office for Anti-poverty of the State Council,quoted from “A Monitoring Report on China’s Rural Poverty ( 2000)” by the research office of rural social economy of national statistics bureau, China’s Statistics Press, 2000, pp. 53; data of 2000 are estimated by the writer.
Figure 3 The purchase price index of agricultural products (taking that of 1978 as 100)
Sources: China Statistical Yearbook, 2001, pp. 282.
2 China has slowed down its pace of poverty reduction since 1990s and analysis of the reasons
2.1 China has slowed down its pace of poverty reduction sine 1990s
China’s per capita output and income have been greatly improved in the first several years of economic reform (1978-1985), and income poverty has correspondently decreased by a large
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000
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margin. According to the official poverty line, rural poverty population has totally decreased by
200 million in the period of 1978-2002, half of the decreased happened in the period of 1978-1985.
In this period poverty population was annually decreased by 17.86 million per year, and the annual growth rate of per capita GDP is 8.3%. The growth rate of farmers’ per capita consumption level and per capita income has been up to 10.0% and 15.1% respectively. Rural population, especially the poverty population has been the main beneficiaries of high economy growth rate in this period.
However, after the second half of the 1980s (1985-1990), although China maintains a fairly high economic growth rate, there are still some indications that the pace of poverty reduction in rural areas has slowed down─the annual decease number of poverty population has reduced by half; poverty population has only decreased by 8 million annually; the average growth rate of farmers’ consumption level per year is only 2.5%; the average growth rate of farmers’ per capita net income is only 3.0% (see table 1).
Table 9 China’s official poverty line and its relative level year Official poverty line
（yuan，present price）
The ratio of farmers’ per capita net income to official poverty line b（%）
The ratio of official poverty line to per capita
GDP b（%）
1978 125 93.6 33.0
1985 205 51.6 24.0
1990 300 43.7 18.4
1991 304 42.9 16.2
1992 317 40.4 13.9
1993 350 38.0 11.9
1994 440 36.0 11.2
1995 530 33.6 10.9
1996 580 30.1 10.4
1997 600 28.7 9.9
1998 625 28.9 9.9
1999
2000
2001
2002
625
625
625
625
28.3
27.7
26.4
25.3
9.5
9.5
8.8
7.9
Note: a. China’s current rural poverty line is calculated and calculated based upon the investigating materials of
67,000 farmer inhabitants’ income and expenditure by t he Rur al Res ea r ch Off ic e of Nat iona l Stat is tic s
Bureau in 1986. China’s rural pover t y line in 1985 is that per capita net income per year is
205 yuan. The standard is adjusted year by year according to price index since then. In
1990 the s tandard is 300 yuan; in 1999 625 yuan. The s tandard, calculated by f ixed price in
1990, only cor responds to 66% of internat ional pover ty standard.
b. China St atis tical Abstract , 2002, pp. 15 and 91.
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In the 1990s (referring to the period of 1990-1997), the highest average growth rate of
China’s per capita GDP is 9.9%, greatly higher than that of the early period of reform (referring to the period of 1978-1985). However, rural poverty population has anually decreased by 5 million, less than 1/3 of that in the period of 1978-1985; farmers’ growth rate of consumption is far lower than economic growth rate (see table1). The growth rate of per capita GDP still remains as high as
7.7% in the period of 1997-2002, but the average decreased number of poverty population per year has continuously reduced to 4.36 million. The average growth rate of farmers’ per capita net income is 3.8%, also lower than that (7.2%) in the reform period (1978-2002).
The decrease of China’s rural poverty population in the 1990s has resulted from the decrease of poverty line. Compared internationally, the income poverty line prescribed by the
Chinese government─per capita net income below 300 yuan(the fixed price in 1990)─is a low-standard poverty line, only corresponding to 66% of international standard. If we make a vertical comparison of data, this standard tends to decrease rapidly compared with farmers’ per capita net income, reducing to 26.3% in 2002 from 43.7% in 1990, and its ratio to per capita GDP reduced to 8.2% in 2002 from 18.4% in 1990 (see table 9). Based on this standard, poverty population estimated by the government is much less than China’s real poverty population, thus the anti-poverty achievement is overestimated (see box 1).
There are still 22 million people stricken by poverty in rural areas by the end of 2000. The objective of providing 80 million poor people with adequate food and clothing promised in “The
Eight-Seven Anti-poverty Plan” set down in 1994 has not been met.
In China’s urban areas, poverty rate has gradually increased since the 1990s, especially the extreme poverty rate and dire poverty rate are obviously increasing. According to Khan’s estimation, the extreme poverty rate has increased to 4.1% from 2.2% in the period of 1988-1995; dire poverty rate has increased from original 1.3% to 2.7%. He estimates that the poorest population has exceeded 10 million in 2001. 4 According to our estimation, urban poverty population has been up to 24.03 million,which plus population with lowest income (per capita income every year is lower than 2497 yuan), will account for 5% of total town population. To one’s fear, the number of laid-off workers and unemployed people has sharply increased, and the
4 Khan,Azizur R. ,1999, Poverty in China in the Period of Globalization, ILO.
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release of payment of employees and retirees was generally defaulted, which leads to rapid increase of poverty population and results in the marginalization of these people. This phenomenon does not only cause serious economic problems, but also imposes grim challenges on
China’s society in the future.
2.2 Analysis of characteristics of China’s poverty since the 1990s
2.2.1 Distribution of poverty population in urban and rural areas
Most of the poverty population live in rural areas, the poverty degree of whom is much deeper than that of urban habitants. One of the major reasons for this disparity is that there is a great gap between per capita income of urban habitants and that of rural habitants, which surpasses that in common developing countries.5 In addition, poor habitants in urban areas enjoy the lowest living insurance provided by the government, while most of poverty population has no other living insurance besides their own land.
2.2.2 Regional distribution of poverty population
Since 1990s, China’s rural poverty gradually demonstrates regional and marginal characteristics. The poverty rate is high in the western areas of China, where poverty population are the most concentrated and the poverty degree is the deepest across the country. According to the data given by the Rural Research Office of National Statistics Bureau in “A Monitoring Report on China’s Rural Poverty (2001) ”, in the 592 national poverty counties prescribed in 1986, about
2/3 of total poverty population are distributed in eastern and middle provinces but poverty population of these regions has decreased rapidly since then. In 2000, 10% of poverty population is distributed in the eastern regions in a fragmentary state; 28% of that is distributed in the middle regions; poverty population in the western 12 provinces and areas has increased by 590 thousand, mainly distributing in condensed state, accounting for 62% in total poverty population of the whole country (see figure 4). According to official poverty line, poverty rate in the west is far higher than that in the east. In 2000, poverty rate in middle-west provinces such as Hei longjiang,
Shanxi, Inner Mongolia, Shanxi, Gansu, Yunnan, Tibet, Guizhou, Qinghai, Ningxia is higher than
10%, while poverty rate in the 8 eastern provinces (namely Shanghai, Beijing, Tianjin and
5 Khan,Azizur R. ,1999, Poverty in China in the Period of Globalization, ILO.
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Zhejiang and so on) has been lower than 1%. Extreme poverty has been thoroughly diminished in these regions. Per capita income of poverty farmers in the western areas is far lower than that in the east, and the rate of poverty occurrence in the west is rather high─about 30% in recent years.
This rate is especially high when these regions are stricken by the impact caused by natural disasters and overall economic declination.
Fig 4 Regional distribution of China’s rural poverty population (2000) cent ral ar eas eastern areas
10%
western areas
62%
Sources: the Rural Research Office of Nat ional Stat is ticsBureau, “A Monitor ing Repor t on China’s Rural Poverty” ( 2001)
2.2.3 The multi-dimensional characteristic of poverty
In the past two decades, the strategies of poverty reduction of the Chinese government are mainly focused on eliminating income poverty, especially those in national poverty counties. It is a reasonable choice of policy, and it is very necessary, too. However, when we are entering the new century, the problems of new types poverty such as human poverty and knowledge poverty are increasingly extruding, the involved population of which is far much larger than that of income poverty. Such types of poverty have gradually become major types of poverty. Human poverty refers to the lack of basic human ability, such as illiteracy, malnutrition, short life expectancy, low level of health condition of mother and infant and the harms caused by preventable diseases, etc
(UNDP, 2000). Knowledge poverty is a new form of poverty when human race enters the knowledge based society in the 21st century, which can be defined as the problems caused by people’s universal lack of the abilities to obtain information, communicate with each other, utilize
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and create knowledge and information, or the lack of basic rights and chances to obtain these abilities. These three types poverty are not independent of one another, but interrelated. Poverty population are not always faced with only one type of poverty, but the problems of multi-dimensional and interdependent poverty. Figure 5 is a three-dimensional coordinate map weighing poverty. It can differentiate various types of poverty. Poverty population faced with the three types of interrelated poverty is inside the cube. One of the indexes weighing status of human poverty is Human Poverty Index (HPI for short). 6 China’s HPI is shown in figure 6. In addition,China’s status of knowledge poverty is reflected by the great gap among different regions
(see figure 7, table 10).
Figure 5 Multi-dimensional framework of poverty
Note: Y refers to average status of income poverty; K refers to average status of knowledge poverty; H refers to average status of health poverty.
Figure 6 Human poverty index
6 Human poverty index is a new index adapted by UNDP in 1997 to measure poverty degree. This index measures three main elements in human life, such as life expectancy, shortage degree of knowledge and decent life. Among them, life expectancy is reflected by the proportion of people who cannot live longer than 40 years in total population; degree of knowledge shortage is measured by illiterate rate of adults; life standard is comprehensively tested by three variables, namely the proportion of people without access to safe water, proportion of people without access to medical care and proportion of under weighted children (below 5 years old).
Income poverty
Human poverty
Knowledge poverty
Y
K
H
16
Sources:UNDP，Overcoming Human Poverty, 2000,New York.
Figure 7 The proportion of illiterates and semiliterate,people above 15 years（1997） sources: China’s Population Yearbook, 1998, pp. 39
Table 10 The ranking of comprehensive knowledge developing index of different regions (1998)
Eastern Areas Central Ares Western Areas
High level（It≥150） Beijing(606.05)
Shanghai(529.03)
0. 00% 10. 00% 20. 00% 30. 00% 40. 00% 50. 00% 60. 00% 70. 00% 80. 00%
Chi na
Indi a
Paki st an
Sout h Af i r i ca
I ndonesi a
Thai l and
Phi l i ppi nes
Wor l d aver age
Devel opi ng Count r y under -wei ght ed r at e, chi l dr en under 5 year s ol d peopl e wi t hout access t o sani t at i on peopl e wi t hout access t o medi cal car e peopl e wi t hout access t o saf e wat er
I l l i t erat e rat e, adul t s
Popul at i on who cannot l i ve l onger t han 40 year s ol d
0.00%
10.00%
20.00%
30.00%
40.00%
50.00%
60.00%
70.00%
80.00%
Bei j ing
Shanghai
Jiangsu
Zhej iang
Guangdong
I nner Mogolia
Gu angxi
Chongqi ng
Si chuan
Gu i z ho u
Yunnan
Ti bet
Shanxi
Ga nsu
Qinghai
Ni n gx i a
Xi nj i ang
Total
Mal e Femal e
17
Tianjin(283.70)
Guang
Dong(212.74)
Fujian(156.48)
Jiangsu(154.55)
Medium-high level（150>It
≥100）
Hainan(127.64)
Liaoning(126.69)
Zhejiang(122.71)
Medium-low level（100>It
≥75）
Jilin(99.53)
Hubei(92.18) Shaanxi(88.05)
Shandong（82.05） Heilongjiang
（84.63）
Hebei（75.69）
Low level（It