American Geographical Society

Communist China's Agriculture: Its Development and Future Potential by Owen L. DawsonReview by: Canute VanderMeerGeographical Review, Vol. 61, No. 1 (Jan., 1971), pp. 152-153Published by: American Geographical SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/213376 .

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THE GEOGRAPHICAL REVIEW THE GEOGRAPHICAL REVIEW

industry and humanity have been inexhaustible sources of stimulus and guidance to innumer- able students and colleagues."

The eleven papers are sharply focused investigations, recent and original, each with its own bibliography, and all but one with a summary. The topics covered are as follows: (1) Pleistocene history of the British flora (R. G. West); (2) the history of the Ericaceae in Ireland

during the Quaternary epoch (G. F. Mitchell and W. A. Watts); (3) land/sea-level changes in Scotland (J.J. Donner); (4) vegetation history in the northwest of England (Winifred Penning- ton); (5) the influence ofMesolithic and Neolithic man on British vegetation (Judith Turner); (7) direction and rate in some British postglacial hydroseres (D. Walker); (8) the ecological history ofBlelham Bog National Nature Reserve (F. Oldfield); (9) maximum summer tem-

perature in relation to the modem and Quaternary distributions of certain Arctic-montane

species in the British Isles (Ann P. Conolly and Eilif Dahl); (o1) the Cambridge pollen refer- ence collection (R. Andrew); and (11) the study of plant macrofossils in British Quaternary deposits (C. A. Dickson). There are useful author and subject indexes. The number of illustra- tions varies from none in the paper by Smith to forty-seven pages of maps, diagrams, and tables in the paper by Conolly and Dahl. For non-British scientists the specialized papers offer particularly good reading after the more general perspective provided by Pennington's book.

The trouble with a Festschrift is that its title cannot reveal its contents adequately to guide potential readers to specific papers. Each essay stands on its own and, in a sense, should be reviewed separately. Such a volume contains the most recent results of research from mature scientists addressing their peers. This particular collection is of high quality throughout and hence is a desirable book to own, even though one's personal interests may be focused on only a few ofthe papers. Harry Godwin can be proud of having intellectually sired such productive offspring, and though British scientists have the advantage of being able to take the book into

the field and thus of benefiting from it directly, to readers elsewhere it serves as a genuine

inspiration.-A. W. KUCHLER

COMMUNIST CHINA'S AGRICULTURE: Its Development and Future Potential. By OWEN L. DAWSON. xvii and 327 pp.; map, diagr. (Praeger Special Studies in International

Economics and Development.) Praeger Publishers, New York, Washington, and Lon-

don, 1970. $15.oo. 92 x 614 inches.

Owen L. Dawson has had considerable experience with agricultural data for China. He was

United States Agricultural Attache in China for seventeen years, until 1949, and since then

has continued to study Chinese agricultural developments. In this book he "reviews recent

changes and the current situation of China's farm resources and . . . attempts to ... project over the next decade the requirements and prospects for sustaining a satisfactory growth in

farm output." Among his conclusions are estimates that in 1967 the population of China

numbered 754 million, up 18.4 percent from 1957 and 30.4 percent from 1952; that "food

grain" production was 213,883,000 metric tons, up 15.6 percent from 1957 and 22.2 percent from 1952; that the area of cultivated land was 110,300,000 hectares, up 2.4 percent from

1958, and the effectively irrigated area was 39 million hectares, up 10o.5 percent from 1963; that production of fertilizers was 10,339,000 metric tons, up 518 percent from 1960; that

tractors in service numbered 150,000 units, up 509 percent from 1957; and that rice and

industry and humanity have been inexhaustible sources of stimulus and guidance to innumer- able students and colleagues."

The eleven papers are sharply focused investigations, recent and original, each with its own bibliography, and all but one with a summary. The topics covered are as follows: (1) Pleistocene history of the British flora (R. G. West); (2) the history of the Ericaceae in Ireland

during the Quaternary epoch (G. F. Mitchell and W. A. Watts); (3) land/sea-level changes in Scotland (J.J. Donner); (4) vegetation history in the northwest of England (Winifred Penning- ton); (5) the influence ofMesolithic and Neolithic man on British vegetation (Judith Turner); (7) direction and rate in some British postglacial hydroseres (D. Walker); (8) the ecological history ofBlelham Bog National Nature Reserve (F. Oldfield); (9) maximum summer tem-

perature in relation to the modem and Quaternary distributions of certain Arctic-montane

species in the British Isles (Ann P. Conolly and Eilif Dahl); (o1) the Cambridge pollen refer- ence collection (R. Andrew); and (11) the study of plant macrofossils in British Quaternary deposits (C. A. Dickson). There are useful author and subject indexes. The number of illustra- tions varies from none in the paper by Smith to forty-seven pages of maps, diagrams, and tables in the paper by Conolly and Dahl. For non-British scientists the specialized papers offer particularly good reading after the more general perspective provided by Pennington's book.

The trouble with a Festschrift is that its title cannot reveal its contents adequately to guide potential readers to specific papers. Each essay stands on its own and, in a sense, should be reviewed separately. Such a volume contains the most recent results of research from mature scientists addressing their peers. This particular collection is of high quality throughout and hence is a desirable book to own, even though one's personal interests may be focused on only a few ofthe papers. Harry Godwin can be proud of having intellectually sired such productive offspring, and though British scientists have the advantage of being able to take the book into

the field and thus of benefiting from it directly, to readers elsewhere it serves as a genuine

inspiration.-A. W. KUCHLER

COMMUNIST CHINA'S AGRICULTURE: Its Development and Future Potential. By OWEN L. DAWSON. xvii and 327 pp.; map, diagr. (Praeger Special Studies in International

Economics and Development.) Praeger Publishers, New York, Washington, and Lon-

don, 1970. $15.oo. 92 x 614 inches.

Owen L. Dawson has had considerable experience with agricultural data for China. He was

United States Agricultural Attache in China for seventeen years, until 1949, and since then

has continued to study Chinese agricultural developments. In this book he "reviews recent

changes and the current situation of China's farm resources and . . . attempts to ... project over the next decade the requirements and prospects for sustaining a satisfactory growth in

farm output." Among his conclusions are estimates that in 1967 the population of China

numbered 754 million, up 18.4 percent from 1957 and 30.4 percent from 1952; that "food

grain" production was 213,883,000 metric tons, up 15.6 percent from 1957 and 22.2 percent from 1952; that the area of cultivated land was 110,300,000 hectares, up 2.4 percent from

1958, and the effectively irrigated area was 39 million hectares, up 10o.5 percent from 1963; that production of fertilizers was 10,339,000 metric tons, up 518 percent from 1960; that

tractors in service numbered 150,000 units, up 509 percent from 1957; and that rice and

152 152

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GEOGRAPHICAL REVIEWS

wheat production were 98,584,300 and 25,892,400 metric tons respectively, up 13.6 percent and 9.7 percent from 1957. Of special interest to geographers are the tables giving estimates of the cultivated and irrigated areas by provinces.

The book has ten chapters and an appendix. There is no concluding chapter, though the last eight pages of Chapter 1o might be considered a summary. In general, the book should have received much more editorial attention with respect to clarity of writing, organization, and footnotes. Also, it contains many inconsistencies and errors.

The first problems were encountered by this reviewer on pages 9 and 1o, where Dawson estimates the number of calories consumed in China per person per day during the 1930's. The calculation is based on his population estimate of 530 million and on the figure 170 million metric tons. There is no indication of what the tonnage represents, though the preceding paragraphs imply that it was the amount of "food" available annually. Complete source information is not given for the figure; a footnote refers to a note on a table in another book, in which the data are in hectares. Further examination of the book cited revealed, in a different table, that an estimated 170.3 million metric tons of "food grains" were produced in China. Dawson's calorie calculation is as follows: "170 M MT + 530 M = 321 kg. gross X .653 = 210 kg. for food use = 574 gr. daily = 1,980 calories - 86 for all food = 2,290

calories. The food balance sheet given by Shen is .653." The page cited in Shen's book con- tains no figure .653, though computations using data on that page reveal that 65.3 percent of the available supply of cereals and potatoes (reduced to one-fourth to be grain equivalent) was the net weight of human food available from cereals and potatoes. So the 170 million metric tons was apparently not "food," but rather "food grains." Yet the food grains, as defined by John Lossing Buck, Owen L. Dawson, and Yuan-li Wu in "Food and Agriculture in Com- munist China" (pp. 56-57) include a number of crops not listed on the page cited in Shen's book. The source of the number 86 used in Dawson's calculation is not given. However, the source of the 0.653 figure indicates that 76 percent of all calories consumed came from cereals and potatoes. Finally, when this reviewer divides 1980 by 86, or by o.86, the result is not 2290.

Samples of inconsistencies or errors include the following. The cultivated area for China in 1967 is given as 110,300,000 hectares on pages 48, 50, and 54, as 1,110,300,000 hectares on

page 47, as 111,300,000 hectares on page 142, and as 110,032,000 hectares on pages 176 and 199; the "grain" area is 128,457,000 hectares for 1967 on pages 199 and 201, and is 136,000,000

hectares "now" (presumably also 1967) on page 19o. A section headed "Estimates of Arable Land" on pages 34 to 36 is utterly confusing in part because it obliges the reader to compare several estimates expressed as percentages of the total area of China with other estimates given in acres or mow, without any reference to Table III (on page 55), where all estimates are given in hectares. Notef on page 187 should be part of note e, and .79 in note e may be an error depending on how Dawson defines "food grain," for which page 242 provides a partial definition.

Although the book is difficult to read, Dawson's extensive knowledge of agricultural conditions in China makes it worthy of examination for the area and production estimates that he considers reasonable. In addition, parts of the text and appendix reveal the methods used to arrive at some of the estimates, methods which are interesting in view of the general lack of official Chinese data, especially since 1959.-CANUTE VANDERMEER

153

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