Comrade Xiannian:

Experiences of this kind [2] should be communicated to all provinces and municipalities by telephone, and such brief reports can also be sent to all provinces and municipalities by the fastest means. In short, the rapid exchange of experience, timely guidance of the movement, constant promotion of achievements, and correction of mistakes are of the utmost importance. The above is for your consideration and handling.

Mao Zedong
September 1

[1] Xiannian, namely Li Xiannian, then Vice Premier of the State Council and concurrently Director of the Fifth Office of the State Council.
[2] Refers to the experience of Jiangsu Province in the work of the "Three Fixes" for grain, published in the 16th issue of the *Grain Briefing* compiled and printed by the Fifth Office of the State Council on August 30, 1955. The briefing stated that in the work of "fixing output, fixing purchase, and fixing sales" for grain in Jiangsu Province, the common feature across all townships was starting from production and ultimately returning to production. The specific approach was roughly divided into three steps: The first step was training backbone personnel, straightening out thinking, and mastering materials. The second step was properly convening the township people's congresses and villagers' meetings, publicizing policies to the masses, explaining methods, clarifying the basis for calculations, and announcing grain retention standards and purchase plans. The third step was carrying out the "Three Fixes" from village to household (i.e., calculations attributed to each household). This was the key to the entire work, and fixing output was an important link. There were four methods for fixing output: (1) Fixing output based on agricultural tax output plus a markup. (2) Fixing output based on actual output in 1954. (3) In areas with exceptionally good or poor harvests last year, fixing output based on the output of 1953. (4) Fixing output based on this year's actual output. After fixing output, purchase and sales could be settled for about 70% to 80% of rural households, while 20% to 30% of households required assessment for increases or decreases. In some places, the "Three Fixes" work in Jiangsu also had shortcomings, such as being relatively crude and failing to integrate fixing output with unified purchase and unified sales. However, judging from the results of the pilot projects, as long as the "Three Fixes" were arranged simultaneously and purchase and sales were carried out in combination, the general situation was good.