Farm Household Economy, Rural Society And Jiangsu Cotton Variety Improvement (1915-1937)

This paper will make comparative analysis of the different attitudes various types of peasants took towards cotton variety improvement in modern Jiangsu Province in areas related to small-scale peasant economy and society, such as tenancy relationship, agricultural economics and rural politics.The main part of the paper is divided into four chapters. The main content and view points of each chapter are as follows.Chapter One analyses cotton variety improvement in Shanghai suburbs. Mainly yeomen lived in Shanghai suburbs, and tenancy relationship was developed. Bound by tenancy relationship, there was a lack of impetus among tenant peasants to improve agriculture. Because of rent deposits and advance rental payments, tenant peasants were conservative in agricultural operations, unwilling to grow new varieties that required more fertilizers or affecting multiple cropping. Due to strict rental payment due times, tenant peasants were reluctant to grow American Cotton, which takes longer to mature. Due to small field sizes, tenant peasants did not want to grow improved cotton which is not suitable for hand spinning. As for the poorest peasants, because their field sizes were too small, no matter how hard they worked, the increase in their agricultural production was limited. As a result, they lacked an impetus for agricultural advancement. Those among the middle and upper classes of peasants owned larger lands, and the main source of family income was income from agriculture. Therefore, they bore the momentum to improve agriculture. Bearing in mind circumstances of the peasants in this area, it is understandable that the Cotton Promotion Institution took the middle and upper classes of peasants as the main target group to improve agriculture in the early days of agricultural improvement. As a matter of fact, this approach yielded good results.Chapter Two analyses cotton variety improvement in Xuzhou area. There were a large number of landlords and rich peasants and also quite a few yeomen in Xuzhou. Many factors, such as the prevalence of unauthorized cotton-picking after harvest, long-term low prices of American Cotton, the lack of animal power, and illiteracy of peasants, restricted the smooth progress of American Cotton extension. Jiangsu Provincial Wheat Testing Institution focused at middle yeomen and rich peasants as the target to extend American Cotton, and offered them technical guidance with regards to cotton growing. The Shanghai Commercial and Savings Bank actively organized cooperatives, with the purpose of providing their members financial support to produce, transport and sell American Cotton so that peasants could gain actual benefits from planting American Cotton. In addition, county governments used political power to ban unauthorized cotton-picking after harvest and to prohibit selling cotton privately. All these measures promoted the advancement of American Cotton extension. This chapter shows that under the circumstances of low education levels of peasants and limited rural finance, this could be said to be an effective way of agricultural improvement:banks and local governments selected middle yeomen and rich peasants with relatively better education background and financial means, let them gain actual benefits from participate in agricultural improvement first, and then attracted other peasants to get involved in this movement through their exemplary role.Chapter Three analyses cotton variety improvement in the salt reclamation region in northern Jiangsu. This was an impoverished tenant peasant society where social tenancy relationship seriously hampered cotton improvement. Deposits and commission charges made it impossible for tenant peasants to rent fields big enough to enable them to sustain their families. Due to small sizes of fields, tenant peasants could not rely on agricultural income to feed their families and, as a result, they had to regard agriculture as subsidiary business, and they were not interested in cotton variety improvement. Because of the cotton-for-rent system, tenant peasants were exploited of their surplus labor to the maximum, so that they did not dare to plant late-maturing improved cotton in part of or whole land, for the sake of a stable yield. The straw-for-rent system meant tenant peasants were less able to improve the soil. They had to plant a lot of alfalfa. The widespread planting of alfalfa interfered with the extension of late-maturing improved cotton. With their areas for food growing strictly limited leading to severe food shortage, some tenant peasants had to be reduced to tenants without fixed landlords, which would result in the lost of fine seeds. Some tenant peasants were forced to engage in family weaving and so had to plant some Chinese cotton, which would affect the promotion of American Cotton. Although Cotton Production and Marketing Cooperative promoted the development of fine cotton, the popularization of fine cotton was ended in failure. This was because cooperatives were dominated by rich peasants, and poverty problem among members were not solved fundamentally. This shows that the reconstruction of rural society and the settlement of rural impoverishment issue are prerequisites for agricultural improvement.Chapter Four first makes comparative analysis of various types of peasants in terms of fertilizing habits, farm implements owned, education received, side work and periods of residing outside village. Then the author comparatively examined different attitudes they had towards matters such as cotton seed selecting, cultivating and weeding, and cotton pests and diseases controlling, all of which have an impact on cotton variety improvement. The small-scale peasant economy and tenancy relationship were both quite developed in Modern Jiangsu. There was a clear distinction between the middle or upper class of peasants with more land and the lower class of peasants with less land in matters such as fertilizing, close planting, intercropping, seed selecting, cultivating and weeding, cotton pests and diseases controlling, which are all related to cotton promotion. The former were much more concerned about agricultural production because agricultural income was their major source of family income. Therefore, when banks gave them a loan to enable them purchase fertilizers, they usually fertilized the soil for cotton planting. On the contrary, the latter rarely fertilized their cotton fields despite banks provided them with fertilizer loans. Because they were so poor and gained so little under the crop-for-rent system, they often made other use of the loans. The former were much more concerned about cotton quality and yield because production from their fields was entirely their own income. Therefore, there was no serious issue with close planting and intercropping and they were generally willing to plant the taller improved cotton which has more yields per unit and higher market values. In contrast, the latter needed to ensure stable cotton yields and solve their fuel problems and, as a result, close planting and intercropping were popular in their cotton fields. In order to get more cotton stalk and by-products from their cotton fields, they were normally reluctant to plant tall cotton variety which would interfere with close planting and intercropping. Staying in village most of the time, the former had more leisure time and were willing to improve cotton growing technology. Therefore they produced cotton varieties of higher purity. The latter were busy all year round and rarely had any time to spare. In addition, most of them did not own a cotton gin. In order to achieve a stable yield, they found it difficult to accept the idea of local pure-breeding. In brief, the latter produced cotton seed of lower purity. The former were more concerned about agricultural production and owned more farm implements. As a result, they were generally diligent in cultivating and weeding, willing to plant improved cotton with higher demand in cultivation and weeding. The latter were more concerned about non-agricultural income and owned few farm tools. Even if they put in a lot of work in their fields, most of any increased yields would go to the landowner. All of these resulted in their indifference to cultivating and weeding, and reluctance to plant improved cotton with higher demand in cultivation and weeding. Due to their relatively higher education levels, the former had more ability to master the knowledge and skills required by new cotton varieties. They were generally willing to catch insects, clean cotton fields timely, held winter plowing and implement crop rotation, in accordance with guidance of staff promoting fine cotton. By contrast, due to a serious lack of large farm implements and the fact that they sometimes had to be migrant workers, the latter found it difficult or were unwilling to prevent and control cotton pests and diseases as instructed by staff promoting fine cotton. All above indicates that, in order for more and more peasants to take advantage of improved cotton sooner, in the early days of cotton variety improvement, the middle and upper classes of peasants made more suitable target groups for promoting good cotton varieties, while the lower class of farmers were not.Finally, the paper points out that, banks preferred to choose the wealthy among all countrymen to join in cooperatives in order to attract peasants to actively participate in cotton variety improvement through the exemplary role of cooperatives, which was a sensible decision from the angle of agricultural promotion. What happened proved that this approach helped the development of cotton variety improvement. Some scholars think that cooperatives excluded poor peasants, hence their low estimation of the cooperative movement. I think this opinion is open to discussion.