Talk:Great Chinese Famine

I do not think these numbers make sense: "According to China Statistical Yearbook (1984), crop production decreased from 2,000,000 tons (1958) to 1,435,000 tons (1960)." 2 million tons is miniscule for a country the size of China (e.g. if they had 500 million population and everyone very unrealistically ate just 40kg food per year, that adds up to 20 million tons food consumption - and people would be dying of starvation in the process 24.218.100.40 01:29, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

NOTE: In one paragraph the population was 678M, and in the next it was "an average of 70M" across the same span of time! There is a decimal point error in the first number, please! SRC

The years 1957-58 saw an occurrence of 'El Nino', though no one knew it existed until the 1960s. This global shift caused abnormal weather in China for the next few years.

Check the Encyclopaedia Britannica Yearbooks for 1958 to 1962: not on-line but a good library should have them. They do speak of abnormal weather, droughts followed by floods. This includes 30 inches of rain at Hong Kong in five days in June 1959, part of a pattern that hit all of South China. This was the classic result of El Nino on Chinese agriculture.

[Official Chinese statistics show a marked fall in the death-rate after Mao came to power, with only the year 1960 coming out worse than the Kuomintang norm.

There is a marked difference between official and ‘reconstructed’ data, the figures that some demographers . Chang & Halliday use some the ‘reconstructed’ data, without bothering to tell the reader that these are not the official statistics. More than that: they appear to mix ‘reconstructed’ and official data, to make Mao look as bad as possible.

The official data shows an inherited rate of 20 per 1000, a norm around just over 1% or 10 per 1000 in the years before and after, and a peak of 25 per 1000. The ‘reconstructed’ data shows an inherited rate of 30 per 1000, a norm around just of 15 to 18 per 1000 in the years before and after, and a peak of 43 per 1000. To get her 38 million, she blends the official norm with the reconstructed peak.

She also muddles a 'demographic shadow' caused by food shortages with actual famine deaths. No one saw famine victims in China in the relevant years, the 'living skeletons' whom we've seen so many other places.

All writers seem blind to the very marked fall in death-rated in the first years of Mao’s rule. Mao regarded the ‘Great Leap’ as a simple extension of policies that had been working very well for the previous 7 or 8 years. Both official and ‘reconstructed’ data suggest a gigantic net gain under Mao, the avoidance of maybe 100 million deaths that would have happened if the Nationalists had stayed in power.

Compare this to the Republic of India, also a success story. "The average Indian male born in the 1990s can expect to live 58.5 years; women can expect to live only slightly longer (59.6 years), according to 1995 estimates. Life expectancy has risen dramatically throughout the century from a scant twenty years in the 1911-20 period. Although men enjoyed a slightly longer life expectancy throughout the first part of the twentieth century, by 1990 women had slightly surpassed men. The death rate declined from 48.6 per 1,000 in the 1910-20 period to fifteen per 1,000 in the 1970s, and improved thereafter, reaching ten per 1,000 by 1990, a rate that held steady through the mid-1990s. Life Expectancy and Mortality in India

Chiang Kai-shek had had 22 years in power and achieved nothing, so the idea that he would have continued to fail is very reasonable. Success in Taiwan means nothing: Taiwan had been thoroughly modernised by the Japanese Empire, which was extremely brutal but very efficient in its modernisation.

--172.201.250.157 18:43, 18 August 2005 (UTC)Gwydion M. Williams

Shocking propaganda. "Official" statistics are the official statistics of the very murderers who perpetrated this horror. Read a damn book. 72.144.68.227 20:43, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

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Though there are a lot of uncertainty about the real number, from many personal memories, it's hard to dispute indeed a lot of people died of starvation during that three years. Even in my hometown, a quite rich place in China, there were many deaths due to lack of food. No one died in my family, though my father said he had very little to eat then. However, my home was in the town, it's believed situation was much worse in villiages.

"Official Data"

Amazing to see that someone would give credence to any Communist dictatorship's "official data" - which were as realistic as "official currency exchange rates" and "official news" published by party organs. The purpose of "official data" was not to provide "objective statistics" but to shape internal and external propaganda. The cost in loss of life and loss of productivity and wealth formation was enormous all thru the communist block. --LPfeffer June 18, 2006

Rename article and NPOV

I believe the article should be renamed to "The Great Chinese Famine". Saying the cause of the famine is purely natural is POV. So we should rename the article and describe all possible causes for the famine. --WinHunter ^(talk) 12:39, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

Btw, I put up the npov tag because this article only voiced the Chinese government view. --WinHunter ^(talk) 12:41, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

I think in both cases you are wrong. "Three Years of Natural Disasters" is how it is referred to in China, this is the name for the phenomenon. While non-Chinese may come up with various non-Chinese descriptions, since we are talking about a Chinese phenomenon, clearly the current common name in China (ie. "Three Years of Natural Disasters") should be the title. The writer also gave alternative names in use in China for these events, so they were being completely fair and impartial. Additionally, the article was objective and gave all the detailed references and analyses which any reader can go and research for themselves, so it is not accurate to apply the npov tag. It is also inacurate to say, as you did, that the article only voiced the Chinese government view - the author cited numerous objective sources, and is not trying to slant the article to any one point of view.--Jimhoward72 18:19, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

In China, Chinese name = CCP view, that is, the official conclusion of the cause of the famine. Rather than a name merely describing the widespread famine, the article name already drawed some degree of conclusion as of the cause. Also, the article exaggerated the role of natural disaster and some side agricultural policies, while some main ones were never mentioned. (e.g. the increased procurement of grain while output decreased.) --WinHunter ^(talk) 19:23, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

That's ridiculous. By that reasoning the Cultural Revolution should be known as the Great chaos and instability period of Chinese semi-civil war. Colipon+(T) 04:52, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

I suppose you meant that to sound absurd. It didn't. Let's not take the party line, shall we? Or do you think the Holocaust was just racial hygiene? 72.144.68.227 20:42, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Citation style tag

The current article only have a seperated section of references. Please consult Wikipedia:References for the correct way of referencing in wikipedia. --WinHunter ^(talk) 19:23, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Spelling?

Section 'Outcome', 3rd paragraph uses the word "governtment". I am assuming that this is a spelling mistake, but have not changed it just in case. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cs1kh (talk • contribs) 14:10, 29 February 2008 (UTC)