财政支持援助农民

Many people living in rural and poor areas in China find it difficult to get loans and insurances. However, as a way to shake off poverty, financial supports are being introduced to rural China and with it, more farmers find a new hope.

"I wish we can sell mutton in a good price. I also hope to buy more goats, so that we could earn more money," Villager Song Mingguo from Puping County, Hebei Province, said.

57-year-old Song Guoming is the breadwinner of his family. With his wife sick and children still at school, his family is struggling in poverty. But last year, he tried to find a solution to it. He loaned fifty thousand yuan from a local bank -- a thing he thought he'll never do. He invested the money in a local farm and bought over a hundred goats.

"Now, I am also working here and get paid with salaries and I also have bonus. I think I could save ten thousand yuan this year. It is ten times more than in the past,"  Song said.

Fuping County has long been struggling to get rid of poverty. But since the beginning of 2015, local villagers have been able to borrow a maximum of 50 thousand yuan from local banks without any mortgage and a three-year grace period of repayment.

The breeding and planting are the main source of income for rural residents in Fuping. Yet both of them are easy to be affected by weather and market fluctuation. They have no skill and poor condition to resist risk. So even with the loan, many are afraid they may not repay it.

Insurance companies reassure local farmers to cover their losses caused by natural disasters, famine, or market price drop.

"The mutton price is relatively low now so if they sell the sheep now, they will lose a yuan for every kilogram, but we will cover that for them," Zhang Chunli, manager of Insurance sector, Fuping Company of PICC, said.

The investment here in Fuping helps to increase the scale of its agriculture industry. So far, the local government says the number of livestock had increased for a hundred-and-40 thousand by 2015 since 2012.

"The loan gives us the capital and insurance lowers the risk, so it is much easier now for the farmers," Hao Guochi, party secretary of  Puping County, Hebei Province, said.

"So far, we have insured nearly two hundred million yuan loans... and that cover nearly 5-thousand households, including 65-percent living in poverty. In average, each household can gain ten thousand yuan income annually," Du Jinli, director of Financial Service Center of Fuping County, said.

The insurance will cover more sectors of local agricultural industries in the future. And it will be expanded to other regions in the province to help nearly five million people eliminate poverty.