Inner Mongolia to lift all poor counties out of poverty by year end

HOHHOT - Northern China's Inner Mongolia autonomous region will lift all of its poor banners and counties out of poverty by the end of this year, said the regional government Thursday.

So far, all the 26 regional-level poor banners and counties and 11 of the 31 national-level poor banners and counties have been lifted out of poverty.

Evaluation work on the 20 national-level poor banners and counties left will be carried out at the end of this year. If the 20 banners and counties can pass the evaluation, all 57 poor banners and counties in the region will be declared out of poverty.

Thanks to poverty alleviation efforts over the past years, the region's poor population living below the country's poverty line in the region's rural and pastoral areas have been reduced to 152,400 by the end of 2018 from 1.57 million in 2013, with the poverty rate cut from 11.7 percent to 1.06 percent.

China aims to wipe out extreme poverty in 2020, with around 95 percent of its poor population set to shake off poverty by the end of this year.