During President Xi Jinping's visit to Southwest China's Guizhou province in June, he stressed the importance of poverty alleviation and development, and said the key to successful poverty alleviation is to ensure it helps those that need to be helped. As a result, "targeted poverty alleviation" has become a hot phrase.

Although China has made great economic achievements in the past more than three decades since the reform and opening-up policy was initiated, it still faces great challenges lifting people out of poverty. There are around 82 million people living in poverty in China. New and effective measures are required to help this impoverished population escape poverty.

Since Xi's comments about poverty alleviation in June, 16 provincial Party leaders have said they are paying great attention to helping people living in poverty in their provinces, and "targeted poverty alleviation" has become a popular phrase in their statements.

Currently there are 592 poverty-stricken counties and 128,000 impoverished villages in China. Most of these are in remote locations with poor natural conditions and poor public services. The local governments should tackle these issues and focus their poverty alleviation efforts on establishing a long-term mechanism to eliminate poverty.