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The Three Years of Natural Disasters (三年自然灾害/三年自然災害) refers to the period in the People's Republic of China between 1959 and 1961. It was the last famine China had, after thousands of years of famines, including one during the 1940s, prior to Communist rule. Despite the name, it is generally openly acknowledged by most everyone, including people within the Communist Party of China, that the root of the disaster was poor economic planning rather than natural causes, and hence "Three Years of Economic Difficulty" and "Period of Three Difficult Years" are also used by China officials to describe this period.

Background

During the Great Leap Forward, farming was collectivized and organized into communes. In addition, a large portion of farmers (estimated 90 million) were working in urban centers on steel production. According to China Statistical Yearbook (1984), corp production decreased from 2,000,000 tons (1958) to 1,435,000 tons (1960). The population of China was about 672,070,000 at 1959.

Outcome

Although official population data of the whole nation is collected at 1953 for election registration and is recollected at 1964, it has famous inaccuracy as other Chinese official numbers does. The official estimated number of death in this period is about 40 million, among them 15 million dead of "abnormal reason". Many analysts estimated the number of of "abnormal death" ranged from 10 millon to 100 million. Some western analysts such as Patricia Buckley Ebrey estimate that about 20-40 million people had died of starvation caused by bad government policy and natural disasters.

Politics

See also: Great Leap Forward (1958-1960)

Reference

China Statistical Yearbook (1984), edited by State Statistical Bureau. China Statistical Publishing House, 1984.Page 83,141,190

• Famines
• History of China
• 1959
• 1960
• 1961