Jakarta, CNN Indonesia —
Alibaba, a giant e-commerce company created by Jack Ma, disbursed 100 billion yuan or around Rp220 trillion to help China achieve mutual prosperity.
“Alibaba is the beneficiary of China’s strong social and economic progress over the past 22 years. We firmly believe that if society and the economy are doing well, then Alibaba will do well,” the company said in an official statement, as quoted by Reuters. CNN Business, Friday (3/9).
The aid was given by Alibaba to fulfill its promise to support Chinese President Xi Jin Ping’s campaign to eradicate poverty.
“We want to do our part to support the realization of shared prosperity through high-quality development,” the statement continued.
The tech giant announced that it would spend a staggering amount of money in 2025, keeping a number of priorities in mind.
These priorities include technological innovation, economic development, creation of high-quality jobs, supporting vulnerable communities and setting up special development funds.
Alibaba also set 10 specific goals it wants to achieve, from increasing technology investment in less developed areas to improving the welfare of the economy’s workers to accelerating the growth of small businesses and agriculture.
The company has also established a Prosperity Progress Working Committee which will be chaired directly by Alibaba Chairman and CEO Daniel Zhang.
Last Thursday (2/9), Alibaba’s shares in New York closed down. A day later, the company’s shares in Hong Kong also flared, dropping as much as 3.5 percent.
Alibaba’s statement pledging assistance came after another major Chinese e-commerce company, Pinduoduo (PDD), pledged to hand over all of its profits for the last quarter to rural development projects in the Bamboo Curtain country.
They will donate US$372 million (approximately Rp.
The decision was significant for a company listed in the US and making its first-ever profit as a publicly traded company in the quarter ending June.
Last month, Tencent (TCEHY) also announced it would dedicate 50 billion yuan, or US$7.7 billion, to helping China achieve its goals of shared prosperity.
TCEHY said the funding was to help increase incomes for the poor, and tackle educational inequality.
Previously, Xi Jin Ping had repeatedly emphasized the importance of shared prosperity as the goal of the Chinese Communist Party. Correspondingly, state media are increasingly highlighting the importance of wealth redistribution.
The phrase shared prosperity has its own historical value in China. The name echoes the voice of former Chinese Communist Party leader Mao Zedong.
At that time, Mao Zedong, advocated common prosperity as a way to mobilize peasants to take power from rural elites including landlords and wealthy peasants.
In recent years, one of Xi’s main policies has been to eradicate poverty across China.
His latest regulations put pressure on the richest citizens and businesses in the Bamboo Curtain Country. In fact, they are already facing tougher regulations, as Beijing continues to control the power of the private sector.
(nsa / bir)
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