The remaining 21,600 poor people in North China's Shanxi province recently all officially moved above the poverty line, according to a recent national poverty alleviation media briefing held by Shanxi Poverty Alleviation and Development Office. 

Shanxi is a key province in the national program for poverty alleviation and development in China. In 2014, the province identified 3.29 million rural poor people, with a poverty incidence rate of 13.6 percent. 

By the end of 2019, all 58 poverty-stricken counties and 7,993 poverty-stricken villages had been lifted out of poverty. The total number of remaining indigent citizens at that time had been reduced to 21,600 and the incidence of destitution had dropped to below 0.1 percent. 

Zhang Jiancheng, deputy director of Shanxi Poverty Alleviation and Development Office, said that this year the province has implemented poverty alleviation policies and measures targeting the remaining 21,600 poor.

For those who are unemployed and unable to extricate themselves from their difficulties, the authorities have acted. Shanxi has provided government non-profit positions for all the 6,227 people who need to be resettled.

For those poor who have no-one working in their families, Shanxi has implemented several policies -- including those related to a basic subsistence allowance system for rural residents, pension, temporary assistance and support for disabled people. 

The province will now move on to improve its mechanism for industry-driven poverty alleviation and prevent people from returning to poverty, so as to facilitate the overall rural revitalization, Zhang added.