The State Council on April 12 unveiled a guideline on reforming the management of funds allocated to rural areas by encouraging poverty-stricken counties to test an integrated use of government funds.
The mechanism for allocating funds from central to local departments remain unchanged, while the authority for approving fund projects will be delegated to poverty-stricken counties.
Related departments of the central authorities will take charge of forming policy, allocation of funds, construction of a system, as well as supervision and assessment. Poverty-alleviation group at the provincial level will be responsible for coordinating and inspecting the pilot work.
Moreover, poverty-stricken counties, as the body of implementation, are urged to integrate the use of financial funds, taking responsibility for the safe, standardized and effective use of funds.
In 2016, every province, city and district are asked to carry out pilot work in extremely poor counties, key counties for national poverty alleviation and development, with a primary focus on counties that are facing heavy tasks in poverty relief. The number of test counties should be no less than one-third of the total poverty-stricken counties. The pilot work will cover all poverty-stricken counties by 2017.
The integrated use of funds will be applied for the development of agricultural production and construction of rural infrastructure.
Central and provincial financing will optimize the structure of transformation of payment, especially in poverty-stricken counties, enhancing their financial security.
On the basis of stepping up investment in poverty alleviation, central and provincial, city finance are urged to focus more on benefiting poverty-stricken counties, making sure the increase in funding applied to poverty-stricken regions and population is no less than the average increase of the fund, ensuring that the people in pilot counties are not worrying about food, clothing, compulsory education, basic medical insurance and secured housing.
Poverty-stricken counties are called to actively explore innovative mechanism, including industrial poverty alleviation and asset income poverty alleviation. It also urged making use of the guiding and leverage function of financial funds, leveraging more financial capital and social capital to get involved in poverty alleviation.
Poverty-stricken counties should make public the source, integrated use of financial fund and the progress of project construction on the local government website and key local media outlets.
