Road Development Economic Growth And Poverty Reduction In China

Since 1985, the Chinese government has given high priority to building roads, particularly high-quality roads that connect industrial centers. This report evaluates the contribution roads have made to poverty reduction and economic growth in China over the last two decades. It disaggregates road infrastructure into different classes to account for differences in their quality, and then estimates the impact of road investments on overall economic growth, agricultural growth, urban growth, urban poverty reduction, and rural poverty reduction. The report makes the case for a greater focus on low-quality and rural roads in future infrastructure investment strategies in China. It does so by showing how investing in low-quality and rural roads will generate larger marginal returns, raise more people out of poverty per yuan invested, and reduce regional development disparity more sharply than investing in high-quality roads. The study's findings will have considerable implications for China's infrastructure policy

How can policymakers effectively reduce poverty? Most mainstream economists advocate promoting economic growth, on the grounds that it generally reduces poverty while bringing other economic benefits. However, this dominant hypothesis offers few alternatives for economies that are unable to grow, or in places where economic growth fails to reduce or actually exacerbates poverty. In Small Works, John A. Donaldson draws on his extensive fieldwork in two Chinese provinces—Yunnan and Guizhou—that are exceptions to the purported relationship between economic growth and poverty reduction. In Yunnan, an outward-oriented developmental state, one that focuses on large-scale, urban development, has largely failed to reduce poverty, even though it succeeded in stimulating economic growth. Provincial policy shaped roads, tourism, and mining in ways that often precluded participation by poor people. By contrast, Guizhou is a micro-oriented state, one that promotes small-scale, low-skill economic opportunities—and so reduces poverty despite slow economic growth. It is no coincidence that this Guizhou approach parallels the ideas encapsulated in the "scientific development view" of China's current president Hu Jintao. After all, Hu, when Guizhou's leader, helped establish the micro-oriented state in the province. Donaldson’s conclusions have implications for our understanding of development and poverty reduction, economic change in China, and the thinking behind China's policy decisions.

Poverty alleviation is a common issue facing the majority of the Third World countries. Since the 1970s, the fact that the number of the poor in some developing countries has increased together with the fact that economic growth has aroused widespread concern of the international community. Therefore, development economics stressed the trade-off between "efficiency" and "equity" under special circumstances and clearly differentiated the concept of "growth" from "development." From then on, how to alleviate and eliminate poverty while pursuing economic growth became a development issue. At present, poverty in China is manifested as regional poverty in the rural society. Unlike the countries which allow free migration of population, the poor of China are concentrated in rural areas. This study focuses on the examination of the role of "Yigong-daizhen" projects in poverty alleviation.

This study systematically investigates the development process, major characteristics and weak links of China's poverty alleviation experience and conducts a comparative analysis of poverty alleviation cases. It also accurately presents the internal logic and core elements of China's poverty alleviation theory and taking the Chinese experience of poverty alleviation refines the "Two Threads One Force" theoretical framework to make a basic judgment of the "China model" for poverty alleviation. It also presents the rationale and plans for responding to new challenges to achieve poverty alleviation goals, which will enhance the welfare of the people and promote social progress and national prosperity.

This book introduces how China plans and implements to achieve the goal of common prosperity. As the internal essential requirement by Chinese social and economic system, common prosperity is a coherent national strategy to combine economic growth and poverty reduction. It explains the path as how to make the "pie" bigger and better, and how to cut and divide the "pie" well . This book also expounds the development thought with Chinese characteristics, which is people-centered and promotes all-round human development, and its achievements. This book helps readers understand China’s path and experience to achieve the common prosperity goal.

This book explores the mechanisms and significance of China’s private economy participating in poverty alleviation. By basing its analysis on theories of development economics and public economics, the book stresses practical significance and abandons unreasonable assumptions. It uses a systematic set of statistical analysis tools and descriptive statistics to provide a multidimensional and highly visual format. Beyond the traditional qualitative comparison of countries, it also introduces quantitative comparison. Considering the increasing concern and curiosity about China’s booming economy and rising private sector, the book is highly topical, offering readers theoretical insights into China’s poverty alleviation mechanisms and essential information on the role played by the private economy in social and economic development.​