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Poor rural people manage vast areas of land and forest. They have the potential to be important players in protecting natural resources and providing important environmental services. An IFAD-supported project has helped build momentum and public interest in rewards for environmental services and has developed ways to offer incentives to poor farmers who protect ecosystems at the national level in China, Indonesia, Laos, Nepal, the Philippines and Viet Nam.

Animal manure is a source of methane, the main component of natural gas and a potent greenhouse gas when released to the atmosphere. But methane can also be captured and used as a source of clean, renewable and affordable energy. An IFAD-supported project in China provided about 30,000 poor households with nearly 23,000 ‘biodigester’ tanks for biogas production. As a result, methane emissions dropped, incomes rose and household sanitation and health improved.

BBC World documentary featuring IFAD-supported project in China

Any project that reduces poverty rates from 90 per cent to 1 per cent sounds too good to be true. Yet that is exactly what happened through an IFAD-funded project in Sichuan, China. Even more encouraging is that it happened under extremely challenging conditions. The outstanding success is the result of good project management and strong governmental support for poverty reduction.

The People’s Republic of China is the third-largest country in the world and home to more than 1.2 billion people. It is a vast collage of sea-coast, fertile plains and valleys, rugged mountains and arid wind-swept deserts. Indeed, China’s vastness and diversity are in many ways an embodiment of the problems and challenges facing small farmers and pastoralists throughout the developing world.

Looks at how China succeeded in reducing poverty on a large scale in rural areas by returning land used for communal farms back to individual families.
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The numbers tell the story: since economic reforms began in 1978, the Chinese economy has quadrupled in size to become the 7th largest in the world. Growth has been especially strong in the last decade, averaging around 9% per year. But this phenomenal growth has come at a price; air quality is being threatened by inefficient fuels in factories and rising vehicle emissions, while serious industrial pollution from untreated effluent is fouling rivers, lakes and coastal waters.

Yunnan Province, home to 26 ethnic minorities, is one of the poorest areas of China. Left out of the economic boom in the cities and coastal areas, its people have few opportunities to better their lives.

In this informative and revealing short programme, Dr. Ray Yip takes us to a classroom in the Gansu province where a group of children, seemingly happy and normal, show strong evidence they have grown up a good part of their lives living with iodine deficiency. As Yip shows us, every child born in an iodine deficient area suffers a substantial intelligence, or IQ loss. Travelling to a salt mine and factory we learn about the progress being made, as well as the problems China still faces, in its attempts to prevent iodine deficiency in the population.

Wei Ming Rui chuckles at the notion that the karst hills in his backyard are considered world wonders. To him, the conical rock formations common to southern China are simply the scenery he has stared at his whole life. As for world wonders, Wei has no clue. The 45-year-old head of Nongxiang village is also its most-traveled man, but he’s never been 30 miles from the house in which he was born and lives to this day.

Every week a group of rural woman of the ethnic Yao minority in south China meet to discuss their plans for household development. They are supported by a microcredit project that helps China's most vulnerable groups of women and children.

"Daddy died three years ago because of the disease called AIDS." Taohua (not her real name) is a skinny 11-year-old girl with a ponytail. She is shy but well spoken. "First he had headaches. Then he got very sick and went to see a doctor, but he just got sicker. My mom wanted to buy some medicine, but our family was too poor. My daddy didn’t want my mom to spend the money."