This book provides unique insights into the challenges and potential solutions to alleviate poverty in western China. Many people are interested in China's economic and social development; the development of Tibet is an important part of this narrative. Unlike big cities in the east of China, Tibet is still underdeveloped, with severe poverty, relatively poor communications, poor infrastructure, transport links, and limited social services. Using deep and well-researched analyses, learned Chinese scholars share their policy insights, experience and knowledge of the underlying causes and potential solutions to this underdevelopment and poverty. The reader is also provided with firsthand accounts of different people in Tibet, ranging from local government officials to poverty-stricken herdsmen. This book gets at the heart of problems faced by ordinary Tibetans, such as dealing with impacts of natural disasters, lack of education, managing ecological resettlement, and trying to prevent the transmission of intergenerational poverty. Looking at these issues from a theoretical, policy, government and practical perspective, Breaking Out of the Poverty Trap - Case Studies from the Tibetan Plateau in Yunnan, Qinghai and Gansu covers the full range of issues in the development of the Tibetan Plateau.