This document is to be distributed to all comrades. The policy is correct, but the reasoning has not been clearly explained. The basic ownership by the production team, with partial ownership by the commune, was the case not only in 1958 but also in 1959 and for several years thereafter. To reverse this and change it to basic ownership by the commune with partial ownership by the production team will require many years. This is a gradual transition from small-scale collective ownership (by the production team) to large-scale collective ownership (by the commune).

*This comment was written beside the article "Is It a Grain Shortage Problem or an Ideological Problem?" in the ninth issue of *Economic News*, compiled and printed on February 19, 1959. The article pointed out that a work group of the Anhui Provincial Committee of the Communist Party of China recently conducted an investigation into the grain-related disturbances in Tongcheng County and discovered that the so-called grain problem in the countryside at present was neither a grain shortage problem nor a problem of excessive state procurement quotas, but rather an ideological problem, especially an ideological problem among grassroots cadres. First, they feared that grain would not be managed under the "three guarantees" method and would instead be uniformly distributed by the commune. Second, they feared that reporting actual output would lead to additional procurement quotas. Third, they feared the adjustment of surplus grain during the spring famine. Fourth, they feared that other teams would not report their actual output, leaving them at a disadvantage. Consequently, many grassroots cadres took the lead in concealing output and engaging in private distribution, sparking a mass wave of grain-related disturbances. After ascertaining the truth of the problem, the county party committee and the work group immediately conducted in-depth ideological education both inside and outside the party, repeatedly explaining the distribution and unified procurement policies to cadres and the masses. They explicitly announced that the 1958 earnings would still be distributed on the basis of the production brigade (the former agricultural cooperative) as the unit, implementing the "three guarantees," with surplus production belonging to the team, and unified procurement tasks settled on the basis of the agricultural cooperative as the unit. There would absolutely be no uncompensated transfer of grain, and all privately stored grain would remain under individual control. As a result, the grain-related disturbances in many production brigades underwent a fundamental change.