Written/Delivered: September 15,
1975.
English translation: Classified Chinese Communist Documents: A
Selection. Taipei :
Institute of International Relations, 1978, pp. 639-643.
Transcription: www.wengewang.org.
HTML/Markup for marxists.org: Juan Fajardo, 2014.
Comrades, How are you?
Thanks to the support of the Party's Central Committee and Chairman Mao, the National Conference for Learning from Tachai in Agriculture can be successfully opened today. I am pleased to have this opportunity to talk with you representatives from various areas on a few questions on behalf of Chairman Mao and the Party's Central Committee. Important questions have been covered by Comrade Teng Hsiao-p'ing and Comrade Hua Kuo-feng. What I am going to state here will be problems of a general nature.
The convocation of the National Conference for Learning from Tachai in Agriculture in Hsiyang county today is an event of immense significance. Over twenty years ago, the Helmsman of Tachai, Comrade Ch'en Yung-kuei, by the use of the hands and wisdom of the people, succeeded in altering heaven and changing the earth. He reclaimed many pieces of good fields, cultivated many crops in this valley previously covered with ravines and slopes, overcame all kinds of natural disasters, and thieved a bumper harvest every year, each one better than the one before. Today, Hsiyang is the first Tachai-style county in the whole country. Its Per capita grain production this year reached 1500 jin, which is an advanced level. If in the next five years, one-third of counties in the nation were t0 accomplish the same achievement as Hsiyang county, the five-year plan for the mechanization of agriculture would definitely be realized ahead of schedule.
It is true that agricultural production in the whole nation is currently encountering some difficulty. This can be imputed to natural disasters and the threat of a capitalist restoration in the countryside. Natural disasters can be surmounted. Haven't many Red Flag irrigation ditches appeared in the country? These are the best proof of our comrades' triumph over drought. The capitalist restoration in agriculture is dangerous, for the pernicious influence of Liu Shao-ch'i's revisionism has been thoroughly eliminated. It is reported that in some production teams there still exists the revisionist policy of San Zi Yi Bao [extension of plots for private use, extension of free markets, an increase in the number of small enterprises with sole responsibility for their own profits or losses. and the fixing of output quotas on the basis of individual households" Isn't it strange? According to the report of our comrades in Kiangsi some counties in that province did not comprehend properly the Central Committee's agricultural policy. They suspect [the feasibility of] agricultural mechanization in five years as programed in the Fifth Five-year Plan formulated by the Central Committee. The emergence of this kind of conservative attitude is also a stumbling block to the development of agriculture. Still, some other comrades in their reports to the Central Committee questioned the feasibility of relying on agricultural banks for the development of the agricultural economy. I would like to advise you here that all development plans for agricultural production must be drawn up in accordance with Chairman Mao's instructions on "practicing self, reliance to acquire adequate clothing and food" rather than on reliance on agricultural credits for developing production. To rely on ourselves and strive for greater achievement is the key to success. Only through self-reliance can we achieve triumph over difficulties.
At present, the common difficulties confronting agricultural production in the country are many-fold: 1) Capitalism is very active in the countryside; 2) Party committee members at the basic level in some areas still do not pay attention to the campaign for learning from Tachai in agriculture, still do not mobilize the masses vigorously for the campaign, or even put up passive resistance to it; 3) Leaders in some areas still hold some bad men in their hands; 4) Some comrades still lack passion for continued revolution under the dictatorship of the proletariat; 5) The class enemy is stirring up waves in sewerage; and 6) Peasants still cherish the ideology of a petty agricultural economy. All the above-mentioned should be criticized and corrected in the agricultural rectification campaign in the future.
Up to this point, our agricultural production is still half-mechanized, and our peasants have not yet become used to agricultural mechanization-Therefore, more training courses in mechanization should be established in county-level agricultural units for large numbers of educated youths selected from rural areas. They should be trained in the operation of agricultural machinery, thus paving the road for agricultural mechanization-Before I came to Shansi, the Chairman asked me to transmit his instruction to you: "Mobilization of the whole Party and development of agriculture in a big way is the great objective of popularizing Tachai-style counties." people in the whole country must work hard and strive to bring about the mechanization of agriculture by 1980. This goal of struggle is a new and great campaign. In the interest of promoting agricultural production, efforts must be made to recruit a number of outstanding individuals for operating modern agricultural machines. This is something to be done for developing and consolidating Tachai-style counties.
In mobilizing the people to learn from Tachai and to turn the county into a Tachai-style county like Hsiyang, there must be a mass rectification campaign for all the people that should concentrate on important problems. Through this campaign, you can guide the Communist passion engendered among the broad cadres and masses in criticizing and combating capitalism and revisionism in the development of agriculture, thus transforming the spirit into a material force and greatly pushing socialist agricultural production. In developing such an all-people rectification campaign, educated youth and members of the Production and Construction Corps are a major force. Hence, the broad masses should join hands with them to criticize the evils of capitalism and carry the all-people rectification campaign through to the end.
In the several years after the Great Cultural Revolution, our cadres and some leading comrades in the Party once again forgot the Chairman's instruction "Never forget the class struggle." The severe class struggle in society has been reflected in our Party. The Hsiyang experience proves that rectification of the working style and reorganization of the Party must be effected frequently so that bad men and their agents can be opportunely eliminated and the purification of the Party ensured. For those good old men who lack revolutionary passion, we should educate them patiently; and for those who resolutely carry on Chairman Mao's revolutionary line, we should render support.
The national campaign to learn from Tachai is a mass movement. Efforts must be made to drive the labor force that has moved into the cities from the countryside in the past back to the countryside and not let the evil wind of capitalism continue to grow. On the other hand, labor departments of the cities concerned should also send back the loose rural labor force which they accepted in the past. In addition, the bonus policy of distributing more and reserving less, which has been practiced in the rural areas for years, should be immediately corrected. If the Party members take the lead in partitioning all harvests, they should be punished according to Party discipline. The Chairman has said that it is necessary 'o revise some of the provisions of the old Sixty-Point Policy for Agricultural Production; however and that the decision should be made by the Standing Committee of the Politburo. The Chairman also said that new regulations would be formulated shortly when the opportunity occurs.
The last question is the problem of popularizing Tachai-style counties. The Central Committee has planned to popularize Tachai-style counties in the coming five years. This will require that all you representatives present today closely examine the existing difficulties after you return to your posts. You will have thoroughly to get rid of the pernicious influence of Liu Shao-ch'i's revisionism, have great socialist ambition, go to settle down in grass root units, concentrate on a certain unit, and then on the whole county. Whether this objective can be reached depends upon you as pathfinders. Only through unified thinking and unified action can we solve the problem.