Development-oriented poverty reduction program targeting the Korean ethnic group in Jilin
Original, GPIG, 03-20-2018
Ten counties including Huichun, Tumen, Longjing, Helong, and Antu in Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture, Jilin Province as well as Changbai Korean Autonomous County, Baishan City are not only areas inhabited by the Korean ethnic group but also well-known border counties in China. There are over 2 million people in those border areas, among which, ethnic minority population reached 415,400. Of the 1,438.7-kilometer-long border in Jilin Province, 1,015.7 kilometers fell on the edge of counties where ethnic minorities lived, accounting for 70.06 percent of the total length of the border in Jilin Province. Those border counties inhabited by ethnic minorities were all distributed in the mountainous areas in eastern Jilin. Since they were geographically remote, problems like underdeveloped infrastructure, lack of clean water and a high proportion of thatched houses and dilapidated houses in rural areas were prevalent in those counties, making it urgent to improve the living conditions for ethnic minorities. Those problems posed a challenge to the drive towards economic development and social stability and harmony. For that reason, the Ethnic Affairs Commission in Jilin, invested in improving infrastructure in border areas and solving the problems of shelter, access to water and increasing income for people of all ethnicities, after an in-depth investigation into the area’s development requirements. Its key mission was stated in the Program to Develop Border Areas and Improve the Lives of the People during the 11th Five-Year Plan period; the central and the local governments made joint efforts to push forward three projects in the Program, namely project to renovate thatched houses and dilapidated houses, project to provide people and animals with safe water, and project to increase farmers’ income.
In the house of Han Yuying, a woman in Chaotiao Village, Shimen Town, Antu County, Yanbian Prefecture, the 54-year-old who belonged to the Korean ethnic group was cooking Korean miso soup, a Korean delicacy. She smiled from ear to ear when mentioning her new house. She said, “This house was built with the support of the village in May last year. We spent less than 4,000 yuan on this 130-square meters house.”
Before that, Han Yingyu had lived for 16 years in a thatched house and the straw on the roof needed to be changed every year. Changing straw was rather troublesome for her as her husband and children all worked outside and seldom came back home. But not changing straw would lead to leaks when it rained. “Last May, a reconstruction project on thatched houses was launched in our village. First off, I worried that I had no money for the reconstruction, later I, together with other villagers were very happy when we heard that the government would provide subsidies and we only needed to pay several thousand yuan.” Han Yingyu smiled and continued to say, “Look at the white walls, blue iron tiles, I have never imagined that I can live in such a beautiful house one day.” Piao Zhenshun, in the same village with Han Yingyu, got a new idea after the reconstruction of her own thatched house: “Government employed professional designers to maintain the traditional ethnic characteristics when reconstructing the house. It suddenly occurred to me that why not make use of the new house full of Korean characteristics to develop farm-based tourism? Leaders in our village and town all supported my idea. This year, our village sponsored an investigative trip in Korea for a few villagers to learn how to run a guesthouse in a farm. Although my project has just started, I’m confident that I can develop it well”, said Piao Zhenshun.
Piao Shengyi, Party branch secretary of Chatiao Village, said that every household in the village got 10,000 to 20,000 yuan in subsidies from the government when reconstructing their thatched houses. And the village also provided funds to build terraced houses for impoverished families who were unable to raise money for the reconstruction. In recent years, led by the local Ethnic Affairs Commission, governments at all levels have invested more than three million yuan to reconstruct the thatched houses in Chatiao Village. Now, the reconstruction of 360 thatched houses in Chatiao Village has been completed.
“What do people want? First of all, having a good house. Therefore, the reconstruction of thatched houses should be a key emphasis in our work”, Ethnic affairs Commissioner of Yanbian Prefecture continued to explain, “since 2006, 11,000 thatched houses, and 300 dilapidated houses for the disabled have been constructed in Yanbian Prefecture.”
Gucheng Village in Sanjiazi Manchu Township, Huichun City, Jilin Province is a special village - the Tumen River separates it from the Democratic People;s Republic of Korea that is towards the north. Although there are only 496 villagers with 157 households, it is a village inhabited by the Korean, Manchu and Han people.
Stepping into the model village, placards saying “cherish people, consolidate border defenses, build a harmonious village, dedicate youth to garrison border areas” or the pictures on this subject posted in the village CPC branch office left a deep impression on a visitor, making him feel the unity and harmony in the village.
Since 2006 when the project of cherishing people and consolidating border areas started, the phrase “unity between the armed forces and the people” got the best interpretation in this border village. “Cherishing people involves visiting people, understanding people, getting close to people and helping people; and consolidating border areas refers to safeguarding the gateway to the country and garrisoning the border.” On the bulletin board in village Party branch, such words were extremely prominent. During the past four years, the interaction between the soldiers and masses reflected that they fulfilled this promise with their own actions.
Zhang Furong is a twelve-year-old girl of Han ethnicity. After losing her father, Furong and her mother depended on mother’s income to scrape a living and the economic conditions in her family is rather bad. Police in the border police station who knew her family’s condition funded her education every year, and often went to see her with school supplies and goodies on festivals. Furong praised the border police, “They have given me a lot of love and warmth. They are just like my family.”
The policemen of Gucheng Village Border Police station often do the school run for left-behind children in the village
Like Zhang Furong, many children in impoverished families are very close to the border police who have brought them a lot of warmth by accompanying them who were left behind to and from school, and helping them with homework.
“They also planted trees for our village, making our village beautiful and helped impoverished households do farm work... They did everything they could.” Zhang Xibo, the former deputy secretary of the Party branch in Gucheng Village, said with great emotion, “Once I met a policeman in casual clothes. He was riding a bike to the village to prune trees for us. I invited him to have a meal in my home, but he declined my invitation, saying he had to go back to work. He really touched me a lot. They served us a lot, but never talked about it nor asked for anything in return.”
In return, the villagers’ enthusiasm also touches the border police. On every Army Day (August 1), villagers would bring agricultural products to give to the border police. Knowing that many police were from other parts of the country, old women in the village always made kimchi for them in autumn.
In fact, on the borderline of Jilin, villages like Gucheng where the relations between the army and people are as harmonious as that between water and fish are countless.
In recent years, the provincial Ethnic Affairs Commission and the provincial border defence corps, have focuses on the strategy of vitalizing border areas and enriching the people’s lives, building new rural areas, and cherishing the people and consolidating border defense. They picked out 38isolated administrative villages close to the borderline where the transportation conditions and social security were not up to par and vowed to make a concerted effort to build them as model villages standing out for their efforts in vitalizing border areas and promoting national unity. Border police stations and model villages made active efforts to hold events with the theme of constructing and defending border areas.
Travelling through villages on the borderline of Jilin, feeling the special charm of the Korean ethnic group, whether it was the clean and neat Korean peasant households or the gentle and hospitable Korean women or the delicious Korean miso soup all gives people a broader understanding of the culture of this ethnic group. The happy smile and the sense of satisfaction shown in the faces of the Korean peasants who have benefited from the government’s policies for poverty reduction among ethnic minorities reflects success of these projects due to the correct guidance given to these projects for revitalizing border areas and enriching the people living there.
Original, GPIG, 03-20-2018
Ten counties including Huichun, Tumen, Longjing, Helong, and Antu in Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture, Jilin Province as well as Changbai Korean Autonomous County, Baishan City are not only areas inhabited by the Korean ethnic group but also well-known border counties in China. There are over 2 million people in those border areas, among which, ethnic minority population reached 415,400. Of the 1,438.7-kilometer-long border in Jilin Province, 1,015.7 kilometers fell on the edge of counties where ethnic minorities lived, accounting for 70.06 percent of the total length of the border in Jilin Province. Those border counties inhabited by ethnic minorities were all distributed in the mountainous areas in eastern Jilin. Since they were geographically remote, problems like underdeveloped infrastructure, lack of clean water and a high proportion of thatched houses and dilapidated houses in rural areas were prevalent in those counties, making it urgent to improve the living conditions for ethnic minorities. Those problems posed a challenge to the drive towards economic development and social stability and harmony. For that reason, the Ethnic Affairs Commission in Jilin, invested in improving infrastructure in border areas and solving the problems of shelter, access to water and increasing income for people of all ethnicities, after an in-depth investigation into the area’s development requirements. Its key mission was stated in the Program to Develop Border Areas and Improve the Lives of the People during the 11th Five-Year Plan period; the central and the local governments made joint efforts to push forward three projects in the Program, namely project to renovate thatched houses and dilapidated houses, project to provide people and animals with safe water, and project to increase farmers’ income.
In the house of Han Yuying, a woman in Chaotiao Village, Shimen Town, Antu County, Yanbian Prefecture, the 54-year-old who belonged to the Korean ethnic group was cooking Korean miso soup, a Korean delicacy. She smiled from ear to ear when mentioning her new house. She said, “This house was built with the support of the village in May last year. We spent less than 4,000 yuan on this 130-square meters house.”
Before that, Han Yingyu had lived for 16 years in a thatched house and the straw on the roof needed to be changed every year. Changing straw was rather troublesome for her as her husband and children all worked outside and seldom came back home. But not changing straw would lead to leaks when it rained. “Last May, a reconstruction project on thatched houses was launched in our village. First off, I worried that I had no money for the reconstruction, later I, together with other villagers were very happy when we heard that the government would provide subsidies and we only needed to pay several thousand yuan.” Han Yingyu smiled and continued to say, “Look at the white walls, blue iron tiles, I have never imagined that I can live in such a beautiful house one day.” Piao Zhenshun, in the same village with Han Yingyu, got a new idea after the reconstruction of her own thatched house: “Government employed professional designers to maintain the traditional ethnic characteristics when reconstructing the house. It suddenly occurred to me that why not make use of the new house full of Korean characteristics to develop farm-based tourism? Leaders in our village and town all supported my idea. This year, our village sponsored an investigative trip in Korea for a few villagers to learn how to run a guesthouse in a farm. Although my project has just started, I’m confident that I can develop it well”, said Piao Zhenshun.
Piao Shengyi, Party branch secretary of Chatiao Village, said that every household in the village got 10,000 to 20,000 yuan in subsidies from the government when reconstructing their thatched houses. And the village also provided funds to build terraced houses for impoverished families who were unable to raise money for the reconstruction. In recent years, led by the local Ethnic Affairs Commission, governments at all levels have invested more than three million yuan to reconstruct the thatched houses in Chatiao Village. Now, the reconstruction of 360 thatched houses in Chatiao Village has been completed.
“What do people want? First of all, having a good house. Therefore, the reconstruction of thatched houses should be a key emphasis in our work”, Ethnic affairs Commissioner of Yanbian Prefecture continued to explain, “since 2006, 11,000 thatched houses, and 300 dilapidated houses for the disabled have been constructed in Yanbian Prefecture.”
Gucheng Village in Sanjiazi Manchu Township, Huichun City, Jilin Province is a special village - the Tumen River separates it from the Democratic People;s Republic of Korea that is towards the north. Although there are only 496 villagers with 157 households, it is a village inhabited by the Korean, Manchu and Han people.
Stepping into the model village, placards saying “cherish people, consolidate border defenses, build a harmonious village, dedicate youth to garrison border areas” or the pictures on this subject posted in the village CPC branch office left a deep impression on a visitor, making him feel the unity and harmony in the village.
Since 2006 when the project of cherishing people and consolidating border areas started, the phrase “unity between the armed forces and the people” got the best interpretation in this border village. “Cherishing people involves visiting people, understanding people, getting close to people and helping people; and consolidating border areas refers to safeguarding the gateway to the country and garrisoning the border.” On the bulletin board in village Party branch, such words were extremely prominent. During the past four years, the interaction between the soldiers and masses reflected that they fulfilled this promise with their own actions.
Zhang Furong is a twelve-year-old girl of Han ethnicity. After losing her father, Furong and her mother depended on mother’s income to scrape a living and the economic conditions in her family is rather bad. Police in the border police station who knew her family’s condition funded her education every year, and often went to see her with school supplies and goodies on festivals. Furong praised the border police, “They have given me a lot of love and warmth. They are just like my family.”
The policemen of Gucheng Village Border Police station often do the school run for left-behind children in the village
Like Zhang Furong, many children in impoverished families are very close to the border police who have brought them a lot of warmth by accompanying them who were left behind to and from school, and helping them with homework.
“They also planted trees for our village, making our village beautiful and helped impoverished households do farm work... They did everything they could.” Zhang Xibo, the former deputy secretary of the Party branch in Gucheng Village, said with great emotion, “Once I met a policeman in casual clothes. He was riding a bike to the village to prune trees for us. I invited him to have a meal in my home, but he declined my invitation, saying he had to go back to work. He really touched me a lot. They served us a lot, but never talked about it nor asked for anything in return.”
In return, the villagers’ enthusiasm also touches the border police. On every Army Day (August 1), villagers would bring agricultural products to give to the border police. Knowing that many police were from other parts of the country, old women in the village always made kimchi for them in autumn.
In fact, on the borderline of Jilin, villages like Gucheng where the relations between the army and people are as harmonious as that between water and fish are countless.
In recent years, the provincial Ethnic Affairs Commission and the provincial border defence corps, have focuses on the strategy of vitalizing border areas and enriching the people’s lives, building new rural areas, and cherishing the people and consolidating border defense. They picked out 38isolated administrative villages close to the borderline where the transportation conditions and social security were not up to par and vowed to make a concerted effort to build them as model villages standing out for their efforts in vitalizing border areas and promoting national unity. Border police stations and model villages made active efforts to hold events with the theme of constructing and defending border areas.
Travelling through villages on the borderline of Jilin, feeling the special charm of the Korean ethnic group, whether it was the clean and neat Korean peasant households or the gentle and hospitable Korean women or the delicious Korean miso soup all gives people a broader understanding of the culture of this ethnic group. The happy smile and the sense of satisfaction shown in the faces of the Korean peasants who have benefited from the government’s policies for poverty reduction among ethnic minorities reflects success of these projects due to the correct guidance given to these projects for revitalizing border areas and enriching the people living there.
