Comments on the Proposal for Producing Food Substitutes [1]
(October 27, 1960)
To be circulated to all Central Bureaus and to the First Secretaries of the Party Committees of provinces, municipalities, and autonomous regions for study and implementation.
Mao Zedong
October 27, 1960
[I]
Hu Qiaomu, Alternate Secretary of the CPC Central Committee Secretariat and Mao Zedong’s secretary, wrote to Mao Zedong on October 27, 1960: “Promoting the production of chlorella is of great significance under the present circumstances of insufficient grain due to natural disasters:
At least it can prevent starvation and reduce or even eliminate edema.
It can also decrease incidents of poisoning caused by indiscriminate gathering of substitute foods.
3. It will help maintain labor productivity and the physical strength of workers and peasants, preventing their decline as a result of food shortages. Moreover, chlorella cultivation hardly competes with crop farming for land, water, fertilizer, or labor. Therefore, I suggest that the Central Committee issue a special directive—extending down to the people’s communes—to promote the production of chlorella and other food substitutes, to be discussed at provincial agricultural conferences, with arrangements made at each level under specific responsibility. In the south, production can continue year-round; in the north, greenhouses will be needed during winter. As winter is already approaching, now is the opportune moment.”
On November 3, 1960, the CPC Central Committee forwarded Hu Qiaomu’s proposal.