At just over 7am on September 30, 2017, a little four-wheeled vehicle was parked near the canteen of Hunan China Resources Power Liyujiang Power Plant, and goods including an electronic scale, plastic ties, fibre bags and two cages of chicken clucking happily were placed next to the vehicle. Seeing this, employees and their family members who came to buy breakfast quickly crowded around, asking the sellers to help them pick and weigh roosters or hens.

It was a couple selling the chicken, the husband called Guo Shaoxiong and the wife called Song Xiaoxiang. The couple lived at Changqing Village in Sidu Town, Guidong County, Chenzhou City, a place stuck in a mountainous area with inconvenient transportation, about 200 kilometres away from Liyujiang Power Plant. The couple drove on bumpy roads over night to come all the way to Liyujiang Power Plant to sell chicken. Why did they do this? Because the place they lived in, Chanqing Village, was where Liyujiang Power Plant carried out targeted poverty alleviation, and they were one of the power plant’s 13 target families for poverty alleviation.

What the couple sold right outside the power plant were Plymouth Rock chicken and chicken with black feather that were purely home grown. As National Day holiday and MidAutumn Day were approaching, the power plant’s employees and family members bought chicken enthusiastically and even recommended them to friends on social networks. In less than 3 hours, the couple sold all the chicken they brought, a total of over 200.Since taking the responsibility to help Changqing Village overcome poverty in 2015, Liyujiang Power Plant has helped Guo Shaoxiong to sell nearly 1,000 fowls. The couple were not the only beneficiaries. Liyujiang Power Plant set up poverty alleviation archives with their target families for poverty alleviation, visiting them from time to time like their relatives to discuss plans to achieve prosperity together.

In May, 2017, the power plant stationed a person in charge at the village as one of the poverty alleviation work team members to guide these target families to overcome poverty. Nowadays, Liyujiang Power Plant’s 13 target families for poverty alleviation are all out of poverty, and as of the end of 2017, the average annual per capita income at Changqing Village increased from RMB2,800 in 2015 to currently over RMB3,210.