Public Service Provision and Poverty Reduction in Rural Tibet
摘要
During the recent two decades, reduced accessibility to basic public goods has become a common problem in most of the inland provinces, and it is particularly the case in the lessdeveloped regions. In response to this situation, the local government in Tibet has secured the normal operation of the agricultural support system, strengthened investment in primary education and basic health care, and has guaranteed social assistance to the key vulnerable groups. There are two main reasons for this. Firstly, it is considered that substantial regional aid enables the local government to perform its public function with adequate fiscal resources. Secondly, external supervision has driven the local government to maintain sufficient political will to provide low-income groups with the basic public services at low prices or free of charge. This is essentially a type of investment-oriented income redistribution.In both the short and long term, it will contribute to reducing the economic inequality that the market mechanism has brought about. In other words, it will help to narrow the regional,sectoral and individual economic gaps.