Luxembourger committed to poverty alleviation in Guangxi

Hechi, which used to be an impoverished area in the northwest of Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region, has established a deep friendship with Luxembourg due to their common efforts to alleviate poverty.

Nico Hansen, a retired Luxembourg police officer, embarked on a sightseeing trip to Hechi in 2015. He was amazed by Hechi's unique karst landscape, but also shocked by the poverty in some of its rural areas.

Hansen decided to stay in a village to help with poverty alleviation work and regarded it as his new life's goal. He met Xie Wanju, the first Party secretary of Zhadong village in Hechi, and said that he would like to help the village without any payment.

Road works, water and housing were three key issues in the village. Among them, roads were of utmost importance. Hansen and Xie spent four hours each day walking in the village, learning details of the village's geographical conditions.

In 2018, the villagers, supported by authorities and businesses, started to work on constructing or repairing the roads. Once the vital transportation links were completed two years later, the villagers began to sell their produce to the outside world.

Zhadong village took off the label of the poor village in November 2020. As a witness to this poverty alleviation campaign, Hansen said that the development of Zhadong over the last few years condensed what should have been decades of development.

Nico Hansen (left) and Xie Wanju help villagers of Zhadong feed silkworms. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]