At the beginning of the 21st century, the UN signed the new Millennium Development Goals, and launched Investing in Development: A Practical Plan to Achieve the Millennium Development Goals. One of the important item is to eliminate extreme poverty and starvation worldwide.
As an NGO, WABA has been paying attention to the balance and coordination of global economic development, studying the economic characteristics of the alcohol industry poverty alleviation region to support the industrial development of poverty-stricken areas. In terms of raw material source of alcohol industry, as the grain for producing alcohol comes from the countryside, it is obtained through farmer’s labor. Grains planted at higher altitudes often produces better alcohol beverages, which brings income for those who live in high mountains and depend on farming for a living, and ultimately helps them to get rid of poverty. The regional industrial growth can effectively promote solving the unbalanced output distribution and fighting against poverty.
From the production process, alcohol production often settles near the raw material region, and employs local labor force. Then to produce products under certain technological processes and natural environment. This gives people in mountainous areas jobs and steady incomes. If each family has a member working in the plant, then it is possible for the whole family to get rid of poverty.
At the same time, WABA also has held many activities such as auctions to enable alcohol enterprises to donate to help the poor. At the annual meeting of WABA 2018, WABA has donated all the funds from the charity auction in the meeting to City Mission, an organization for helping the poor in Auckland. WABA wishes that all people all over the world can live a life free from poverty and live in happiness.
Industrial poverty alleviation is the key to eliminating poverty. Since its establishment, WABA has issued the Development Report of Global Alcohol Industry each year, which analyzes the present, development environment, development cycle, development trend, marketing mode of alcohol industry to promote its growth. In addition, WABA has set up a series of expert committees on tasting, circulation and marketing, cultural brand, business operation, quality and safety to promote the scientific development, internationalization of standards and globalization of the industry. Via the cross-field integration and innovation, WABA is committed to give full play to its role of formulation standards, researching problems, and providing consulting service and so on to accelerate the exchanges of global alcohol industry. By doing so, it can drive the industrial development in poverty-stricken regions and stimulate more poor people to find jobs.
Educational poverty alleviation is an important driving force of eliminating poverty. To help the poor, it is crucial to support the intellectual development and to eliminate the illiterate. At the 60th anniversary of Jiangnan University, WABA and the experts of Jiangnan University has jointly discussed some frontier issues such as how moderate drinking and the drinker’s wager game to facilitate people’s health. WABA also had participated in 973 Project of China’s Key Basic Research and Development Plan, which experimented with Moutai and obtained the results that P53 factors in Moutai Baijiu is beneficial to human health. And the report of Molecular Mechanism Study of Moutai on Liver Function” was published in the Development Report of Global Alcohol Industry 2015. These research gave people a deeper understanding of alcohol beverages, enhanced the scientific development of alcohol industry, narrowed the gap with the developed regions, and improved the balanced regional development. Meanwhile, by holding the annual meeting all round the world, WABA is able to introduce the advanced capitals, technologies, management experience to promote the balanced and coordinated regional development and poverty alleviation.
WABAIR researcher Fu Shuang
