Poverty alleviation expanding overseas with Belt and Road Initiative: charity head

China's poverty alleviation efforts have expanded overseas under the Belt and Road Initiative, with long-term aid programs established in Southeast Asia and Africa, said a leader of an official  Chinese charitable organization on Tuesday.

The China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation, a nongovernmental charitable organization supervised by the State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation and Development, has invested a total 140 million yuan ($20 million) and established humanitarian and long-term aid projects in 20 countries and regions including Nepal, Myanmar, Cambodia, Ethiopia, Sudan, and Uganda, said Chen Hongtao, foundation deputy secretary-general.

The foundation provided schools with free meals, computers and scholarships. It also helped women with employment training, Chen told the Global Times on Tuesday, a day before China's fifth National Poverty Alleviation Day.

Since 2015, the foundation has provided 200,000 free meals a year to more than 5,000 students at over 50 schools in Sudan and Ethiopia and plans to train 100 Ethiopian women in handicrafts such as stone carving and straw weaving.

In Myanmar, the foundation has granted 5 million yuan to 1,300 college students from poor families. Each student received 2,500 yuan a year for four-year study, Chen said.

In Nepal, it has distributed free toilets, built a water tower and hand washing sinks.

It has also trained 800 women, 200 children and 50 teachers, according to Chen.

The foundation this year donated tens of thousands of packages containing stationery, water bottles, lunchboxes and books to poor primary school students in Myanmar, Nepal and Cambodia.

Since 2009, it has donated 5 million such packages to Chinese primary schools in poor areas.

Globally about 884 million people have no access to safe drinking water, according to the foundation.

Some 121 million children and adolescents are out of school and 800 million people live in hunger.

Chinese NGOs should learn from their foreign counterparts in management, fundraising, project design and supervision, Chen said.