1. basic information
butuo at the heart of liangshan yi autonomous prefecture, sichuan province, is among the regions in extreme poverty stretching along the wumeng mountain. there is a large presence of the yi ethnic minority group in this hilly, chilly area whose economy is primarily farming and herding. covering 1,685 square kilometers, butuo consists of 30 towns and townships, 190 administrative villages and two urban communities. of its population of 191,200, 184,100, or 96.3 percent, are yi people, and 177,800, or 93 percent, live on farming. its 2017 gdp was 2.43 billion yuan and its per capita gdp 12,700 yuan, which accounted for only 21.3 percent of the national average. by the end of 2017, 122 villages and 57,299 people of 12,367 households in the county were registered as impoverished (including 30 villages of extreme poverty), which put the local poverty headcount ratio at 30 percent.
butuo plans to completely shake off poverty by 2020. in 2018, 45 villages and 16,417 people of 3,537 households are expected to rise above poverty.
2. poverty alleviation efforts in recent years
in 2013 the group company launched targeted poverty alleviation program in the county, which is undertaken by its sichuan energy company. three personnel from the company work temporarily in butuo as deputy county magistrate, deputy party secretary in a township and party secretary in a village respectively.
to boost local education, the company spent 5 million yuan to build and rebuild a town-level kindergarten and four village kindergartens. to improve local medical services, it bought 4 million yuan worth of medical equipment for the county hospital. what鈥檚 more, it invested 2 million yuan to build infrastructures in bozuo village, and forked out 800,000 yuan to build a farmers鈥?training base in the county party school, which has so far offered training to 4,000 people. to reduce poverty through industrial development, the company promotes standardized poultry breeding and family range of appropriate scales, puts equal emphasis on boosting collective economy and highlighting the exemplary role of private entrepreneurs, and develop feature plantation and cultivation businesses.
