On December 15, 2020 “Consolidating Achievements in Poverty Alleviation, Leading to Rural Revitalization” 2020 Experience Sharing and Kickoff Meeting for Collection on Poverty Alleviation Efforts by Foreign-funded Enterprises was held at China World Summit Hotel in Beijing, hosted by China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation (CFPA) and China Association of Enterprises with Foreign Investment (CAEFI).

▲ Gaoqiang Yuan, Vice President of CAEFI

    At the conference, Mr. Gaoqiang Yuan, Vice President of China Association of Enterprises with Foreign Investment said: “Foreign-funded enterprises are not only contributors to China’s high-quality economic development, but also an important force in the fight against poverty in China. In recent years, under the guidance of the State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation and Development, CAEFI and CFPA have actively mobilized foreign-funded enterprises to participate in poverty alleviation work, and have made a combination of precise poverty alleviation through a series of projects and events such as project research and matching, donations, Multinational Company Western China Investment Tour, and the selection of excellent cases of poverty alleviation, all achieved obvious results. At the same time, a special social responsibility working committee was established to guide and promote the philanthropic activities of enterprises. In the future, foreign-funded enterprises will continue to play an important role in the rural revitalization strategy.”

▲ Wenkai Zheng, President of CFPA

    Wenkai Zheng, President of CFPA, expressed his views on the participation of foreign-funded enterprises in the fight against poverty in China: “Over the past years, the work of foreign enterprises in poverty alleviation has been focused on the overall situation of poverty alleviation, with rich contents and vivid cases, fully reflecting the strong sense of social responsibility of foreign-funded enterprises and realizing our original intention of building a platform, which has also been recognized by various departments and praised by the community.  Foreign-funded enterprises have created many valuable experiences that can be replicated and scaled up. Together with our partners, we will continue to consolidate and expand the achievements in poverty eradication, implement rural construction actions and accelerate the modernization of agriculture and rural areas. In this new historical process, foreign-funded enterprises’ poverty alleviation actions will have great potential.”

▲ Guosheng Deng, Vice Dean of School of Public Policy and Management of Tsinghua University released instructions for the 2020 “Foreign-funded Enterprise Poverty Alleviation Initiative” case collection

    Professor Guosheng Deng, Vice Dean of School of Public Policy and Management and director of the Research Center for Social Innovation and Rural Revitalization of Tsinghua University, shared the research findings of foreign-funded enterprises’ participation in poverty alleviation in 2019. He analyzed that the most involved area for foreign-invested enterprises is still poverty alleviation through education - 80% of them have invested in education, and the participation in poverty alleviation through consumption is weaker in comparison. in terms of the effect of participation in poverty alleviation, the number of beneficiaries has increased. The main motivation for foreign-funded enterprise to participate in poverty alleviation is to fulfill social responsibility and respond to the call for targeted poverty alleviation. This year is the closing year of the poverty alleviation campaign, he hoped that foreign-invested enterprises could review and summarize their contributions in the 13th Five-Year Plan period when foreign-funded enterprises participated in the national major strategy of poverty alleviation. Finally, he said that not only for foreign-funded enterprises need a platform to carry out poverty alleviation, but more importantly, they can bring demonstration and leadership to the cause of rural revitalization in China, which is of great value.

▲ Hongyu Zhang, Vice Dean of China Institute for Rural Studies of Tsinghua University and member of Expert Advisory Committee on Rural Revitalization of the Central Agricultural Office and the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development explains the “Rural Revitalization” policy

    In addition, the conference was also attended by foreign-funded enterprises in China that have long been committed to poverty alleviation campaign in China. Nan Cao, Government Affairs Manager of Qualcomm, introduced Qualcomm’s poverty alleviation projects based on education, health and livelihood development which were launched by the "Wireless Care" program under the basic strategy of supporting precise poverty alleviation and eradication in China; Ran Cui, Senior Director of Samsung China's Corporate Social Responsibility Department, presented the "In China, for China" project, about Samsung China's decades of philanthropic practices in China, starting from poverty alleviation through livelihood development, health, etc., committed to become a company loved by the Chinese people and contribute to Chinese society; Dong Wang, Senor Director of Corporate Communication Department of Visa China, introduced the education of inclusive finance from Visa China; Weijia Wang, Director of Government Affairs of Dell China, proposed to focus on using the power of technology in poverty alleviation through youth education and development; Chunhongn Yu, General Manager of Public Policy, Sustainability and Integration Development of Coca-Cola China, shared the vision and practice of Coca-Cola Philanthropy Fund; Shupeng Li, Executive Director of Corporate Affairs of AstraZeneca, shared the active use of the company's own advantages to promote the development of health projects in poverty alleviation.

    The roundtable Discussion was moderated by Dong Wang, Senor Director of Corporate Communication Department of Visa China, who invited Genwei Liu, Project Manager of Schneider Vocational Education, Bu Guan, Executive Director of Sales of USANA Health Sciences, Keke Chen, Corporate Social Responsibility Manager of Herbalife, Lili Yang, Vice President of China of Sinophil, and Professor Hongyu Zhang, shared their thoughts on poverty alleviation practices, effectiveness and their understanding on the theme of "Consolidating Achievements in Poverty Alleviation, Leading to Rural Revitalization".

▲  Call for cases of foreign-funded enterprises’ poverty alleviation actions in 2020

    Finally, representatives from the Ministry of Commerce, China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation, China Association of Enterprises with Foreign Investment, School of Public Administration of Tsinghua University, and Center for Social Innovation and Rural Revitalization jointly launched the 2020 "Foreign-funded Enterprise Poverty Alleviation Initiative" case collection campaign. Poverty alleviation and rural revitalization are related to building a moderately prosperous society, which requires the participation and joint efforts of the whole society. In the future, the "Foreign-funded Enterprise Poverty Alleviation Initiative " platform will continue to gather the strength of many parties to consolidate and expand the achievements of poverty eradication, implement rural construction actions, and accelerate the modernization of agriculture and rural areas.