As the new Country Director for UNDP China, having arrived from Lesotho – an African country of almost 2 million people – I am constantly impressed by China’s statistics relating to alleviating poverty and the Millennium Development Goals. For instance, between 1990 and 2011, China lifted a staggering 439 million people out of poverty, and the extreme poverty rate in China dropped by 94%. China has contributed to 76% of global poverty reduction achieved to date, and has met other key development goals, including those relating to universal primary education, safe drinking water and sanitation, and maternal mortality.

Nevertheless, as I ponder these huge achievements I am struck by the fact that poverty does still remain in China. As was cited repeatedly at the Global Poverty Reduction and Development Forum, organized on 16 October 2015 and opened by President Xi Jinping, today just over 70 million people still live below China’s national poverty line. This is about the equivalent of the entire population of Thailand here in Asia.

The Chinese government has laudably committed to address this. President Xi designated poverty reduction as a major part of his domestic agenda, and in visits to Yan’an and Guiyang earlier this year he announced a target to lift all the remaining poor people in rural China out of poverty by 2020. This really means lifting 11 million people out of poverty, every year for five years running. It will be no mean feat.

But having worked in China for just over two month now, I am already convinced China can do this. In 1994, the first ever poverty relief action plan in China’s history was released, with clearly defined objectives, targets, measures and a deadline to help lift 80 million people out of poverty. This was followed by two further China Rural Poverty Reduction and Development Programs from 2001-2010 and 2011-2020. The State Council Leading Group of Poverty Alleviation and Development and its Office (LGOP), that hosted the October 16th conference, has played a key role in this. Few other countries have such a special coordination mechanism. Added to this, the funding and initiatives devoted to poverty reduction have continued to increase in absolute and per capita terms, and China is constantly adopting policies to strengthen people’s self-resilience. Recent new policies to allow farmers to use land as collateral for loans stand as a good example.

Over the last 30 years, UNDP, including through the International Poverty Reduction Center in China (IPRCC), has been assisting in this process. Yet, while I believe China can meet its poverty reduction targets, I also believe there continues to be a role for UNDP in supporting China to do so. Two reasons stand out. First, poverty is not simply a lack of adequate income; it is also a lack of knowledge, health, dignity, rights, and voice. UNDP can support central and local governments to really target and reach marginalized groups, such as ethnic minority women, who may have little voice but need help in achieving self-sufficiency. UNDP has been working to empower ethnic minority women to use their traditional skills and crafts to improve livelihoods and socio-economic status while preserving their cultural identity.

Second, UNDP can bring innovation and ideas from our global network to China to consider and pilot. For example, one of the UNDP’s comprehensive and innovate strategies to reduce poverty, “inclusive finance” is a powerful tool to address the lack of financial services. As early as 1994, UNDP established microfinance pilots in 49 counties across 17 provinces and autonomous regions. We continue to pilot innovative approaches, such as business management training, credit cooperatives, agent and mobile banking to support poor and low-income farmers, which, if successful, can be scaled up by central and local governments.

Many countries around the world are rightly envious of China’s achievements in poverty alleviation. While eradicating poverty is now just one aspect of the new Sustainable Development Goals agreed by 193 UN Member States in September 2015, it nevertheless remains critical. At UNDP, we will remain on hand to help China complete the job of eradicating domestic poverty by 2020. And we will also remain on hand to support China to share its experiences in poverty alleviation with envious and admiring countries.

The author is UNDP country director in China.