Poverty alleviation in ethnic areas is an important part of China’s poverty alleviation.Since 1949,the poverty alleviation in ethnic areas has roughly experienced six stages,including a small-scale relief-oriented poverty alleviation,indirect poverty alleviation driven by institutional reforms, regional poverty alleviation driven by project development, comprehensive poverty alleviation in the poverty alleviation stage of the August 7 th,and the targeted poverty reduction based on the whole village since the implementation of Western Development until 2013.Its prominent feature is that the main motivation of poverty alleviation is economic growth;The focus of poverty alleviation ranges from " areas" to " the fusion of points and areas",then back to " points"; the model of poverty alleviation turns from relief to development and then to the integration of development and social security. Future poverty alleviation in ethnic minority areas will face with the following challenges.First,the expansion of income gap may lead to a significant decline in relative poverty reduction effect of economic growth. Second,urbanization and population flow could make more poor people leak from poverty alleviation policy. Third,cultural differences will have adversely impact on poverty reduction.