David Ferguson | Win the Battle Against Poverty

读书嘉宾：外文出版社英籍高级改稿专家，《习近平谈治国理政》第一、二、三卷英文版改稿人。

英文文本：

Win the Battle Against Poverty

We must win the tough battle against poverty, as our Party has made a solemn promise to the people. We must be true to our promise. Since the 18th CPC National Congress in 2012, poverty eradication is the only issue on which Party and government heads at the provincial level have signed written pledges. All Party and government officials, especially top leaders at every level, must enhance their political awareness and sense of responsibility, and lead efforts to fulfill this mission.

Here I would like to emphasize that Party committees and governments of impoverished counties assume the main responsibility in poverty elimination, and their top leaders are the first persons responsible. During the final stage of the fight against poverty, officials should remain steadfast in their posts and focus on this task. Those incapable of the task should be replaced, and those involved in fraud and falsification must be held accountable. The central departments concerned should research and formulate an action plan on poverty elimination,and set a timetable and roadmap for ending extreme poverty in three years.

I have emphasized repeatedly that we should maintain the current poverty eradication standard,neither raising nor lowering it. Guaranteeing access to compulsory education means ensuring that children from poor families do not drop out of school during the compulsory education period. Guaranteeing access to medical care means covering all impoverished people with medical insurance which will make treatment of common and chronic diseases accessible and affordable for them, and allow them to maintain their normal life should they suffer from a serious illness. Guaranteeing access to safe housing means moving impoverished people out of dilapidated houses.Ensuring drinking water safety means giving all rural people access to safe drinking water through a coordinated approach. This is a basic national requirement, but the situation varies from place to place. For example, in terms of housing safety, attention should be given to ventilation in south China while keeping warm is essentially important in north China; in terms of drinking water safety, northwest China should focus on accessibility of water while southwest China needs to solve the problems of water supply, storage and quality. All regions should be flexible and take their own realities into consideration rather than imposing a uniform requirement. Various measures have been explored in solving pressing problems concerning the Three Guarantees,but some regions have raised the standard either consciously or unconsciously.The regions that have raised the threshold far beyond the national standard should scale it down, and those that have kept the bar by and large unchanged should continue to maintain the stability and consistency of policies.

The effort to deliver the Two Assurances and Three Guarantees should be based on a clear knowledge of the actual situation and any pressing problems. But in some localities, things remain vague. This is not acceptable. The relevant authorities should help all localities to identify the problems so as to take targeted measures. They should also coordinate efforts to make statistics accurate and consistent. The authorities in charge of specific sectors should take the lead in working out plans, and all provinces and equivalent administrative units should formulate specific measures, timetables, and schemes to ensure that tasks are completed as scheduled. We have adequate policies and enough funds for addressing the Three Guarantees, but the key is to get things done. We should work harder and direct more attention to the most prominent problems, identifying gaps and improving weaknesses one by one and from household to household.We should fully publicize our policies and standards, to ensure an accurate understanding among all sectors of society and unify our thinking.