The second Belt and Road Visit for Hong Kong Young International Legal Talent — jointly organized by the Office of the Commissioner of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and the Hong Kong International Legal Talents Training Academy of the HKSAR’s Department of Justice — took 20 young legal professionals from the HKSAR to Yunnan province and Laos from July 18 to 24.
The delegation visited Kunming and Malipo in Yunnan before traveling to Vientiane and Luang Prabang in Laos, gaining exposure to regional legal practices, multilateral cooperation mechanisms, and the outcomes of China-Laos cooperation. The visit offered a firsthand opportunity to connect legal training with a much larger story — China’s record on poverty reduction and its growing effort to share that experience with the world.
Malipo’s story is typical of Chinese-style poverty alleviation. As a border county once affected by widespread insufficiency, Malipo’s poverty reduction was closely tied to local industry development, transport connectivity, and infrastructure upgrading. Support by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs helped turn local resources such as tea, sanqi (a medicinal herb) and other agricultural products into income-generating industries. In addition, local secondary schools tailor teaching methods by offering intangible cultural heritage courses like batik of the Bailuo people to needy students, securing the baseline against poverty through skilled employment. The example of Malipo shows how poverty alleviation works when policies match local geography and market potential. The contrast between before and after poverty alleviation is evident in these places.
The visit also showed that law is not detached from development. It is the institutional language through which policy is implemented, infrastructure is governed, and cross-border cooperation is sustained. That is why China’s success in fighting poverty matters beyond China itself. It offers a powerful reminder that long-term poverty reduction requires vision, institutions, and the discipline to adapt development to real local conditions
Malipo is only one example of a much broader national achievement. According to a joint report released in 2022 by China’s Ministry of Finance, the Development Research Center of the State Council, and the World Bank, the number of people in China living below the World Bank’s international poverty line of $1.90 per day fell by close to 800 million over the four decades following the start of reform and opening-up in 1978, accounting for close to three-quarters of the total global reduction in extreme poverty over that period. Measured against China’s own national poverty standard, the number of poor people fell by 770 million over the same period. The World Bank’s country overview confirms that by 2020, China had eradicated extreme poverty according to the official definition, a transformation that also moved the country from low-income to upper-middle-income status.
The final phase of that campaign was swift and deliberate. At the start of the 2013 targeted poverty alleviation drive, 98.99 million rural residents lived under the national poverty line, earning less than 2,300 yuan ($341) a year. By 2020, that number had fallen to 5.51 million, and official statistics indicated that all 98.99 million people, all 832 nationally designated impoverished counties, and all 128,000 poor villages had been lifted out of absolute poverty. To meet the deadline that the central government set for the end of 2020, more than 10 million people had to be lifted out of poverty every year, roughly 1 million a month. President Xi Jinping told the 75th session of the United Nations General Assembly that China had every confidence in meeting the poverty eradication target set out in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development 10 years ahead of schedule, an assertion that was realized later and confirmed by the World Bank’s data.
None of this occurred simply through subsidies. The joint World Bank and Chinese government report attributes the achievement to a combination of sustained economic growth, averaging over 9 percent a year since 1978, alongside targeted government intervention in areas where broad growth was insufficient. This included industrial development tailored to local conditions, infrastructure investment, relocation of households from geographically disadvantaged areas, and expanded access to education and healthcare, backed by a rural social security floor for those unable to work.
China has increasingly regarded these experiences as a contribution to global development rather than a purely domestic accomplishment. A 2021 State Council Information Office white paper, Poverty Alleviation: China’s Experience and Contribution, stated that China’s poverty reduction had not only improved domestic welfare but also made an important contribution to world poverty reduction and overall human progress. Chinese officials have since described the country’s poverty reduction experience as an example that other developing nations can study and adapt. This narrative underpins the Belt and Road Initiative’s (BRI) development dimension, through which China has extended trade, infrastructure, and finance cooperation to partner countries as part of a broader effort linked to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
The China-Laos Railway, one of the flagship projects associated with that effort, illustrates the idea in practice. By connecting Kunming and Vientiane, the railway has lowered transport costs, expanded market access for agricultural and industrial goods, and supported tourism flows between southern China and Laos, giving the landlocked developing country new channels for trade connectivity. In fact, the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific has cited multiple studies whose findings show that the BRI’s infrastructure developments generally have positive effects on the economy, income, poverty reduction, employment, equality and inclusion in the targeted countries. Additionally, it also stated that the BRI could potentially contribute toward lifting 7.6 million people from extreme poverty and another 32 million people from moderate poverty, mostly in BRI-participating countries. In that sense, the BRI is not merely an infrastructure program but also a development platform through which China’s poverty reduction experience can be translated into regional opportunity.
For the young legal professionals who took part in the Belt and Road Visit, it was much more than just a study tour. It provided a structured encounter with how a poverty reduction strategy built on economic growth, targeted intervention, and legal and administrative accountability can be translated into an international cooperation framework extending to neighboring countries. The visit also showed that law is not detached from development. It is the institutional language through which policy is implemented, infrastructure is governed, and cross-border cooperation is sustained. That is why China’s success in fighting poverty matters beyond China itself. It offers a powerful reminder that long-term poverty reduction requires vision, institutions, and the discipline to adapt development to real local conditions.
The author is a youth ambassador for the Hong Kong Association for External Friendship.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.
