For China to realize its goal of building a better-off society by 2020, lifting the country's 70 million poor residents out of abject poverty is a target that must be met. Officials from the office in charge of the work, which is under the State Council, the country's Cabinet, expressed their optimism on Monday the task will be fulfilled on time.

It is good to have a target, which entails necessary plans and detailed measures for it to be realized. But the planners should not take it for granted that dragging that many residents out of destitution in six years will mean the problem of poverty is addressed once and for all.

Even if the input of money and manpower by the government indeed gives the necessary helping hand to the last batch of poverty-stricken residents, it is still just a stage in the battle to eliminate poverty for good.