Relentless effort turns poor village around in three years

The villagers of Yangkulun in North China's Hebei province were living in extreme poverty when a work team from the province's judicial department first arrived at the village in the spring of 2017.

Since then the team has made tremendous effort to improve the villagers' living standard.

The first step they took after their arrival was to expand the area of land for bean growing as they knew at the time the business generated most of the villagers' income. By the end of 2017, all the 437 registered poor families were engaged in the business and managing 241 bean greenhouses, laying the groundwork for poverty eradication in the village.

In order to diversify the villagers' income sources, the team then invited agricultural experts to teach them how to grow other crops such as melons and quinoa. They also made efforts to expand the market for the village's farm produce.

The team also drew on a special fund for poverty alleviation to build a photovoltaic-driven power plant jointly owned by the village and four other neighboring villages. In 2019, the plant added nearly 600,000 yuan ($90,000) to the village's total revenue, further expanding residents' purses.

Apart from the effort to raise villagers' income, the team also helped them renovate shaky homes, apply for the basic living allowance, repair the local power grid, introduce running water to every household and so on. All these projects significantly improved the village's living environment.

As a result of the team's strenuous effort over the past three years, the village achieved its goal of poverty elimination this year.