Reversal of fortunes

Huichang county in Jiangxi province has been singled out for national-level poverty alleviation relief and development measures, with the Luoxiao Mountain region having an exceptionally high number of poverty-stricken counties in particular.

Li Fashun, 44, is a local villager in Nantian village, Gaopai township. Coming from a low income family, he applied for a poverty alleviation loan under the guidance and assistance of the village's poverty alleviation officials, which allowed his family to plant navel oranges.

Seeing an improvement in his income, Li set up a fruit cooperative with several of his fellow villagers in 2018. Besides planting navel oranges himself, he bought navel oranges grown by other villagers to sell externally, helping to lift the villagers out of poverty.

There are still a lot of fruit farmers like him who rely on planting to escape poverty in Huichang. At present, the planting area of navel oranges and orange pomelos in the county is more than 13,333 hectares, of which 11,667 hectares are oranges and 1,667 hectares pomelos.

The annual yield of navel oranges is 150,000 tons compared to 10,000 tons of orange pomelo. The local government has issued special policies to support villagers in areas such as industrial development and promotional marketing.

Relying on the cultivation of special agricultural products, Huichang has achieved remarkable results in fighting poverty.

By the end of 2018, the population of people living in poverty in Huichang dropped to 3,274, compared with 62,485 at the end of 2014. The incidence of poverty slipped to 0.73 percent, and it was 14.02 percent at the end of 2014. All 88 poverty-stricken villages had their "poverty hats" removed.

Through the vigorous development of navel orange and orange pomelo plantations in recent years and other measures to combat poverty, the Jiangxi provincial government on April 28 formally approved Huichang county to withdraw from the ranks of poverty stricken counties.

Photos by Chen Zebing

China Daily