Economic Development and Achievement: An Overview

Abstract

When the People’s Republic of China (PRC) was established in 1949 it was a typical agrarian society with 92 per cent of its population living in rural areas. Modern industry was no more than a few recognisable islands in a vast ocean of agriculture and small businesses. Years of war had severely damaged industry and it did not recover to its prewar record level until 1952. Even then China’s pig iron output was only 1 930 000 tons, the level Japan had reached in 1935, the output of steel was 1 350 000 tons, equal to Japan’s in 1933, and total electricity production was 73 billion watts, the volume generated by Japan in 1924. China’s 1952 grain output was 1.6 billion tons, less than half of what it now produces. Overall, China’s industrial level, including in the northeast area where Japan invested heavily during the Manchurian period, was lower than that of Japan.¹