Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: $Revision: 1.6.2.16 $; site inmet.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!cca!inmet!janw From: janw@inmet.UUCP Newsgroups: net.politics.theory Subject: Re: Re: Re: Newsflash! [JoSH on Socialis Message-ID: <28200215@inmet.UUCP> Date: Wed, 23-Oct-85 19:01:00 EDT Article-I.D.: inmet.28200215 Posted: Wed Oct 23 19:01:00 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 26-Oct-85 06:29:43 EDT References: <876@water.UUCP> Lines: 35 Nf-ID: #R:water:-87600:inmet:28200215:000:1656 Nf-From: inmet!janw Oct 23 19:01:00 1985 [Richard Carnes, ihnp4!gargoyle!carnes] > I wish someone would be specific about what has happened in China's > economy, and what has permitted the relative economic prosperity > China has experienced since the revolution (no famine, population > coming under control, etc.). The following is from "China, Alive in a Bitter Sea", by Fox Butterfield, Bantam Books, p. 15. > > For recent Western Studies show that food consumption per capita > > is actually only about what it was in the mid-1950s, and, more > > surprisingly, no better than in the 1930s, before World War Two. > > > > These studies suggest that the average daily calorie supply in > > China is between 2,000 and 2,100 per person. Two thousand > > calories a day is the level of India, 2,100 is the norm in Pakis- > > tan. Americans eat an average of 3,240 calories a day. > > > > But what makes these figures worse is that three fourths of the > > protein in the Chinese diet and five sixth of the calories are > > derived from food grains like rice, wheat and corn, rather than > > from other richer and more varied sources like meat, fish, eggs, > > vegetables, or sugar. In Asia only Bangladesh and Laos approach > > these proportions. BANGLADESH AND LAOS, Richard. Bangladesh and Laos. > > Uneven distribution has compounded this shortage of food. A Com- > > munist periodical in Hong Kong disclosed in 1978, while I was > > there, that the annual grain ration of 200 million Chinese > > peasants was less than 330 pounds a year. "That is to say", the > > journal said, "they are living in a state of semistarvation". Jan Wasilewsky