Agriculture: 1949-63

Question 1

Agrarian Reform Law

Answer 1

> June 1950
Sped up the process of land reforms.
CCP members went to the countryside to organise the peasants against the landlords.
People’s Courts + Speak bitterness meetings.

Question 2

How many landlords were killed because of the Agrarian Reform Law?

Answer 2

2 and 3/4 million

Question 3

How much land was re-purposed and for how many people?

Answer 3

47 million hectares (nearly half the cultivated land) was given to 300 million peasants.

Question 4

What was the main problem with the Agrarian Reform Act and how did they combat it?

Answer 4

> Peasants did not have the machinery needed to cultivate their new land.
Mutual aid teams (about 10 holdings) would work together and share resources.

Question 5

Speak Bitterness Meetings

Answer 5

Meetings where peasants were able to voice old injustices done to them by their landlords.

Question 6

People’s Courts

Answer 6

As a result of Speak Bitterness Meetings, landlords would be put on trial for their crimes and could often result in the landlords being beaten or killed.

Question 7

Agricultural Producers Cooperatives (APC’s)

Answer 7

> 1953-55
30-50 Families
Although land was still owned by the peasants, it was now on permanent loan to the government, which in return for they received a small rent payment.

Question 8

Cooperatives

Answer 8

> 1955-56
200-300 families
No longer owned land, equipment or animals, except for a small patch on which they could grow vegetables and keep chickens.

Question 9

Communes

Answer 9

> 1958
30,000 people
Owned nothing, not even furniture.

Question 10

Aims of the Great Leap Forward

Answer 10

> To be large enough to tackle large projects such as irrigation and education of the youth.
Produce crops
Produce steel
Live communally, not in familial units.

Question 11

Agricultural problems with the GLF

Answer 11

> Floods and Droughts ruined the harvests.
Too much emphasis was put on industry to allow them to produce enough food.
Communist leaders had no knowledge of the land they were farming.
Waste products from industry destroyed agriculture.
20-40 million starved.

Question 12

Problems with GLF Communes

Answer 12

> Too large to be run efficiently.
Family units were split up.
Cadres held too much power + lied about production levels.

Question 13

Why did the GLF fail?

Answer 13

> Floods and Droughts
No support from USSR, their scientists, engineers and funding dried up.
Mao had not considered the practical problems.
Needed capital investment, technology and planning, all three of which Mao deemed revisionist.