James Kimonyo, Rwandan Ambassador to China (WEI YAO) 

Chinese President Xi Jinping said on December 3 that China has accomplished its poverty alleviation target of the new era as scheduled. Through eight years of sustained work, China has lifted all rural poor population based on the current standard out of poverty, and nearly 100 million poor people have shaken off poverty. 

James Kimonyo, Rwandan Ambassador to China, said it is commendable that China has successfully lifted millions of people from poverty within this short period of time. 

“I think many of the countries should learn from what China has done,” Kimonyo told ChinAfrica in an exclusive interview. He said that the approach China took is what economists or social workers call the multidimensional poverty index, because poverty cannot be described based on just someone's income or where he or she lives. There are a number of things that are required for people to be considered out of poverty, and a lack of which would make them poor. 

The approach China used looked at those dimensions. Do our children have access to education? Do people have better places to live in? Do they have access to an effective healthcare system? 

“When you begin to address those critical issues facing people, then you're essentially addressing poverty issues and therefore, reducing poverty. From what I know so far in China and from reading a number of materials, including the book by President Xi, Up and Out of Poverty, apart from looking at it from that wider, broader perspective, there is another important approach that China used - targeted measures,” the ambassador said. 

He said that poverty alleviation in China is not an umbrella project for an entire community, but rather it looks at those who are critically affected by some of the issues mentioned above. The Communist Party of China (CPC) and the government looked at people who were in dire need in terms of access to education, healthcare and housing. 

Kimonyo shared with ChinAfrica his experience of visiting some of the places and seeing how people moved out of extremely terrible type of housing to better housing. “That gave them a chance to engage in other economic activities. If you don't [have a multidimensional approach] then you run the risk of addressing one issue and leaving others unaddressed and your efforts to reduce poverty may not be successful,” he said.