19 dic 1957 anni - Great Leap Forward

Descrizione:

Liu Shaoqi announced the Second Five Year Plan to the Eight Party Congress, asking pepole to create a new China overnight.

REASONS for the Great Leap Forward:

- Mao's enthusiasm and faith, especially in the superity of communism over capitalism.
- Mao wanted to continue the industrial progress started in the First Year Plan, this time without relying on the Soviet Union.
- Mao thought the collectivisation of agriculture would provide sufficient food to feed the expanding workforce.

FEATURES:

- Involvement of the whole population to achieve targets, including the use of manual labour rather than machines.
- Collectivisation of agriculture: Farms were forced into communes, where all land, equipment and animals were property of the state
- Backyard Furnaces: Whole of China was involved in the campaign to produce steel. Around 600,000 furnaces set up across the
country. Men left the fields to work at the furnaces.
- Privately owned businesses came to an end, allowing the CCP to control exactly what was produced by industry.

RESULTS:

- Outstanding achievements of labour: 11 million tonnes of steel were produced.
- Collectivisation failed and 50 million died.
- Steel produced in backyard furnaces was of such poor quality that officials ahd to throw it away. Farmers had melted their tools and equipment for nothing.
- Production in businesses decreased, as there was NO profit incentive.

Mao admitted that the Great Leap Forward had failed, and Mao resigned temporarily.

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