4Learning - Secondary - Resources4Learning - Secondary - Resources - Geography - Place and People: Changing China

North of the Qin Ling Mountains: Here the rainfall is light and variable. Winter temperatures of —8ºC, combined with bitingly cold winds, make the growing season short and difficult, and water is in short supply. The main crops are millet, wheat and maize.
South of the Qin Ling Mountains: This warm wet area, with summer temperatures as high as 40ºC and with frost only rarely occuring in winter, is a major source of agricultural produce. The main crop is rice, but the climate also permits the growth of cotton, tobacco, sugar cane and citrus fruits. The extreme south is tropical, and two, or in some places three, crops per year are possible.

The political background to agricultural life is common to all regions of China. The changes in land ownership that have happened since the communist government took power in 1949 are summarised in the Introduction section of these Net Notes. The most recent reforms to have a significant effect on farming were the division of land in the early 1980s to give each family an equal per-capita share, and the introduction of the Household Responsibility scheme, which allows families to decide within certain constraints what crops they grow, what investment they are prepared to make in their farms, and what happens to the crops and the profits they produce. This has freed most peasant farmers from the constraints formerly imposed by the rigid commune system.

In practice, many small family farms are run under the Household Responsibility system by the women of the family, who under collectivisation took on a wide variety of agricultural roles. As the men of the family increasingly migrate to the cities in search of work as a result of developments linked to market liberalisation, the role of women on the land has increased.

The village of Xiaowanghu lies to the northwest of Beijing in northern China, while the village of Da Meizi lies in Yunnan Province in southern China. The differences in climate and landscape between the two areas are reflected in the types of farming practiced. The following table lists the main differences between the two areas:

Xiaowanghu	Da Meizi
Arid climate.	Temperate climate: warm and wet.
20 kilometres north of the Great Wall.	2000 kilometres southwest of Beijing, east of Kunming.
Latitude: 41ºN.	Latitude: 25ºN.
Extreme winter temperature: —17ºC.	Extreme winter temperature: +5ºC.
Only 90 frost-free days per year.	Frost rare: average 9 days per year.
Extremes of temperature: freezing winters, scorching summers.	Invariably warm and wet: temperate in Meizi, subtropical further south.
Land share: 3 mu per person.	Land share: half a mu of irrigated land and one mu of rain-fed land per person.
Staple food: wheat (steamed bread, dumplings, noodles).	Staple food: rice.
Main cash crop: maize.	Main cash crops: rice, wheat, vegetables.
Remote: no nearby market.	Close to market.
Irrigation restricted to twice yearly.	Land irrigated frequently.
Water shortage: risk of falling water table; borehole supply; short growing season for single crop.	No water shortage: high rainfall; two or three crops each year.
Other work scarce, involving migration to city.	Other work available near by.
Village facilities still poor: funded from agriculture alone.	Village facilities improving: funded from sale of surplus crops and profits of local factory.