The family rice bowl: food and domestic economy in China.

Abstract

Based on systematic interviews in two rural and two urban settings in 1980 and a thorough review of the literature, it deals with the evolution of the Chinese food system and the policy issues facing it, as well as with what and how much food individual families eat. Also provides insights on family economic organization and survival strategies and on the relationships of the household with larger social, economic, and political units. Shows that by means of national policies stimulating grain production and of making sufficient rations of basic grains available to everyone on the basis of need at affordable prices, China has been successful in providing guaranteed 'minimum' access to staple foods for all persons and groups. At the same time, encouraging both individual households and collective production of non-staple foods for their own consumption and for local markets, the variety, nutritive quality, and quantity of the average Chinese diet has been improved. Shows how the changes in economic and social structure following the revolution were a necessary prerequisite for this system in which entitlements to food are based primarily on needs and labour inputs rather than on purchasing power in the market and the ownership of land and other capital. Finally, considers the problems facing China now and in the future to continue increasing average per capita food production and consumption.-after Preface