Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-wzw2p Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-06-04T05:23:24.642Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Industrial Production in Communist China: 1957–1968

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 February 2009

Extract

For the years before 1958, because Communist China published data on the physical output of a large number of industrial commodities, it was possible to construct an index of industrial production that could be used with confidence. As early as 1959, however, there was a noticeable drying up of official reports as a source of data and objective commentary and, since the collapse of the Leap Forward in 1960, the regime has imposed an almost complete blackout on the disclosure of specific economic facts and figures. As a result, the number of commodities for which physical output can be estimated has been reduced sharply, and the estimates are subject to a wide range of error.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 1970

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 See my article, “Chinese Communist Industrial Production,” in An Economic Profile of Mainland China (Joint Economic Committee (JEC) of the United States Congress: Washington, 1967). I appreciate the comments made by Professors Dwight Perkins, H., Ta-chung Liu and Kang Chao at the hearings held by the Joint Economic Committee, in the pages of this journal or to me personally. They were extremely helpfuls in preparing the revised index presented here.Google Scholar

2 The physical output series are presented in Table II; those estimates that have been revised are noted.Google Scholar

3 The formula for this adjustment is:

where I represents the index of total industrial production; I′ represents the index computed from the sample output data; and α and β represent the average annual rates of growth during 1953–57 of the index of total industrial production and of the sample index, respectively. For a more complete description of this method of adjustment see Norman Kaplan, M. and Richard Moorsteen, H., Index of Soviet Industrial Output (Santa Monica, 1960), pp. 6168.Google Scholar

4 U.S. Federal Power Commission, World Power Data(1966). The figure is the mean of year-end data for 1965 and 1966.Google Scholar

5 The figure is drawn from a Red Guard publication cited in Kung-Lee Wang, “China's Mineral Industries in 1967: Victims of the Cultural Revolution,” Asian Survey (Berkeley, California), No. 6 (1969), p. 427. He presents estimates of 325 million metric tons and 225 million metric tons for 1966 and 1967, respectively. These estimates are considerably higher than mine.Google Scholar

6 Colina MacDougall, “What About the Workers?”, Far Eastern Economic Review, 3 10 1968, p. 69Google Scholar; or “Communist China Economy at Mid-Year 1968: Eighteen Months of Disorder,”Current Scene (Hong Kong: U.S. Information Service), No. 12 (1968), p. 6.Google Scholar

7 Radio Peace and Progress, Moscow, cited a Peking Red Guard publication, The East is Red, in a broadcast on 24 09 1967.Google Scholar

8 “China's Industrial and Transport Fronts Forge Ahead in Revolution and Production,” Peking Review, No. 40 (1968), p. 35.Google Scholar

9 Radio Peking, 26 12 1969.Google Scholar

10 NCNA, 5 01 1967, in Survey of China Mainland Press, No. 3856 (10 January 1967), p. 25.Google Scholar

11 “China's Taching Oilfield: Eclipse of an Industrial Model,” Current Scene, No. 16 (1968), p. 5.Google Scholar

12 “Brilliant Achievements Made in Grasping Revolution and Promoting Production,” China Pictorial (Peking), No. 3 (1968), p. 39.Google Scholar

13 Radio Peking, 25 09 1968.Google Scholar

14 NCNA, 26 09 1968Google Scholar, in Survey of China Mainland Press, No. 4270 (2 10 1968), p. 15.Google Scholar

15 “Grasp Revolution, Promote Production and Win New Victories on the Industrial Front,” Jen-min jih-pao, 21 02 1969.Google Scholar

16 Colina MacDougall, “What About the Workers?”, Far Eastern Economic Review, 3 10 1968, p. 69.Google Scholar

17 Sankei (Tokyo), 23 08 1967.Google Scholar

18 NCNA, Anshan, 16 01 1968.Google Scholar

19 Wang, P. K., “The Mineral Industry of Mainland China,” Minerals Yearbook (Washington, 1967), p. 197.Google Scholar

20 Radio Peking, 27 04 1968.Google Scholar

21 Radio Peking, 30 12 1968.Google Scholar

22 Radio Peking, 4 05 1969.Google Scholar

23 Radio Peking, 30 12 1968.Google Scholar

24 R, Marion. Larsen, “China's Agriculture Under Communism,” An Economic Profile of Mainland China, p. 246.Google Scholar

25 Tzu-liao chuan-chi (Special Issue of Materials), No. 7 (1968)Google Scholar, inSurvey of China Mainland Press, No. 4154 (8 04 1968), p. 3.Google Scholar

26 Radio Huhohaote, 6 03 1968.Google Scholar

27 Chou En-lai, Speech to Canton Delegates to Peking, 14 11 1967Google Scholar, in Tzu-liao chuan-chi (Special Reference Material Supplement), 17 11 1967Google Scholar, in Survey of China Mainland Press, No. 4080 (14 12 1967), p. 4.Google Scholar

28 Radio Peking, 2 01 1969.Google Scholar

29 Radio Peking, 25 12 1969.Google Scholar

30 NCNA, 31 03 1965Google Scholar, in Survey of China Mainland Press, No. 3431 (5 04 1965), p. 23.Google Scholar

31 Radio Peking, 23 12 1965.Google Scholar

32 NCNA, Lanchow, 22 02 1968Google Scholar, Survey of China Mainland Press, No. 4125 (26 02 1968), p. 26.Google Scholar

33 Radio Changsha, 23 12 1969.Google Scholar

34 Radio Harbin, 29 09 1969.Google Scholar

35 State Statistical Bureau, Ten Great Years (Peking, 1960), p. 96.Google Scholar

36 See my article, “Chinese Communist Industrial Production,” in An Economic Profile of Communist China, p. 294.Google Scholar

37 UN, Food and Agricultural Organization, Yearbook of Forest Product Statistics (Washington, 1968).Google Scholar

38 Radio Peking, 18 09 1969.Google Scholar

39 Derived from the increase reported in Chou En-lai's speech to the 1st session of the 3rd National People's Congress on 212212 1964.Google ScholarSee Survey of China Mainland Press, No. 3370 (5 01 1965), p. 3.Google Scholar

40 Radio Peking, 20 08 1969.Google Scholar

41 NCNA, Wuhan, 7 02 1969.Google Scholar

42 Radio Cheng-t'u, 6 02 1968.Google Scholar

43 The lower estimate is from Owen Dawson, L., “China's Cotton Outlook,” The China Mainland Review, No. 3 (1966), p. 178.Google ScholarThe higher estimate, which was made by Steve Washenko, is from U.S. Foreign Agricultural Service, Hong Kong, No. AGR-233 (31 12 1968).Google Scholar

44 State Statistical Bureau, Wo-kuo kang-t'ieh tien-li mei-t'an chi-hsieh fang-chih tsao-chih kung-yeh ti chin-hsi (Chinese Iron and Steel, Electric Power, Coal, Machinery, Textile, and Paper Industries—Past and Present) (Peking, 1958).Google Scholar

45 The ration data are drawn from the text and the population data from S, John. Aird, Estimates and Projections of the Population of Mainland China: 1953–1986, U.S. Bureau of the Census, Series P-91, No. 17 (Washington, 1968), projections I and D. I also made calculations based on projections IV and C, but the differences were not great.Google Scholar

46 “Communist China Economy at Mid-Year 1968: Eighteen Months of Disorder,” Current Scene, No. 12 (1968), p. 7.Google Scholar

47 Mainichi, 28 05 1967.Google Scholar

48 Radio Hangchow, 20 09 1967.Google Scholar

49 Kuan Shan-yuan, “People's Livelihood as Seen by the Supply of Cotton Cloth,” Fei-ch'ing yen-chiu (Studies on Chinese Communism) (Taipeh), No. 12 (1968), pp. 2631Google Scholarin Joint Publications Research Service, No. 48,694 (20 08 1969), pp. 5365.Google Scholar

50 “China's Industrial and Transport Fronts Forge Ahead in Revolution and Production,” Peking Review, No. 40 (1968), p. 25.Google Scholar

51 U.S. Foreign Agricultural Service, Hong Kong, No. AGR-99 (28 03 1967).Google ScholarThe percentage increase is drawn from an article by the Minister of Light Industry in Ta-kung pao (Hong Kong), 30 09 1965.Google Scholar

52 Radio Peking, 29 04 1966.Google Scholar

53 U.S. Foreign Agricultural Service, Hong Kong, No. AGR-52 (2 11 1967).Google Scholar

54 NCNA, 27 10 1967,Google Scholarin Survey of China Mainland Press, No. 4051 (31 10 1967), p. 18.Google Scholar

55 U.S. Foreign Agricultural Service, Hong Kong, No. HK9020 (25 02 1969).Google Scholar