SHENZHEN, Oct. 18 (Xinhua) -- A metro train in south China's metropolis of Shenzhen started on Saturday to dedicate its advertisement space to specialty foods from poverty-stricken areas in nine Chinese provinces.

Passengers aboard the train, dubbed the "poverty relief express", can conveniently scan the QR codes on pictures of farm produce grown in 54 counties in the provinces to enter an online store and purchase the goods.

Saturday marked the seventh National Poverty Relief Day, as well as the 28th International Day for the Eradication of Poverty.

According to the Shenzhen municipal office of poverty alleviation, the initiative of using the metro train for promoting poverty relief takes advantage of the metro system's multiple locations, wide coverage and large passenger flow, creating a community spirit in support of the national efforts to eradicate absolute poverty.

After 40 years of rapid growth, Shenzhen now ranks fifth among Asian cities in terms of gross domestic product (GDP), which expanded at an annual rate of 20.7 percent to 2.7 trillion yuan (about 403 billion U.S. dollars) in 2019.

The city has been actively promoting the sales of poverty alleviation products in supermarkets. Shenzhen has purchased more than 9 billion yuan of poverty alleviation products so far this year from 832 poverty-stricken counties nationwide and from 11 cities in Guangdong's less-developed areas.