GLOBAL POVERTY REDUCTION FORUM

Your Excellency the Vice-Premier of the State Council of the People’s Republic of China

Your Excellencies Deputy Prime Minister Vissoth and Deputy Prime Minister Sabino

Your Excellency the Minister of Agriculture 

Excellencies, Friends

各位朋友你们好！

Over recent decades, China has lifted some 800 million people out of absolute poverty.

This breathtaking achievement is not just for China.

It’s a gigantic contribution to SDG 1: to Eliminate Poverty around the world.

China’s example is literally without historical precedent.

And the world, the Global South in particular, stand urgently to learn and benefit.

Because, by coincidence, the number of people living globally in extreme poverty today is exactly the same number: 800 million.

This Forum represents a key opportunity to continue sharingworldwide China’s extraordinary experience in uplifting the poorest and most marginal.

Friends —

It is also a moment to congratulate China on the self-reflection of the Fifteenth Five Year Plan.

It squarely faces that poverty alleviation can never be considered “finished”.

The Shí Wǔ Wǔ proposes resolute measures to overcome the “unbalanced development” in some corners, which remains as a by-product of the China’s exponential growth.

And similarly to address some of the “fragility” of poverty reduction, so we shore up these great gains.

This is precisely the Agenda 2030 spirit, which pledges a sustainable development that “leaves no on behind”.

It is now my honour to read to you the Message of His Excellency, the United Nations Secretary-General, António Guterres.

MESSAGE OF THE SECRETARY-GENERAL

I send greetings to the participants of the 2026 Global Poverty Reduction and Development Forum. 

I commend the Government of China and the International Poverty Reduction Center in China for organizing this important gathering. 

Despite recent progress, poverty remains a global development emergency, affecting people in every corner of the world. 

Eight-hundred million women, children and men still live in extreme poverty — from remote rural communities to crowded urban slums.

Their plight is made worse by conflicts, climate change, deepening inequalities, and heavy debt burdens. 

Meetings like yours give me hope that solutions are in reach. 

Governments must invest in decent work, quality education, health care, resilient rural development and universal social protection. 

Developing countries need financing and fiscal space to invest in development. 

The Sevilla Commitment reached last year calls for urgent action to unlock more financing, create measures to address the debt burdens of developing countries and reform an unfair global financial system so developing countries receive the support and representation they deserve.

And last year’s World Social Summit called for stronger social policies and investments that can reduce poverty, inequality and exclusion. 

Guided by these global commitments and the solutions discussed at this Forum, we can shape economies that put people first and continue our fight to reduce — and end poverty. 

谢谢大家！