Following the founding of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in 1949, the Shanxi Provincial Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) conducted a survey on agricultural production in the province’s old revolutionary base areas, which had extensive experience with mutual aid labor. The committee subsequently published its findings in the People’s Daily. Building on this research, the Shanxi Provincial Committee piloted ten experimental agricultural cooperatives in its Changzhi region in the spring of 1951. By focusing on the improvement of farming techniques, these cooperatives demonstrated clear superiority in agricultural output compared with both mutual aid teams and individual household farmers. This development prompted the CPC North China Bureau to convene the“Xiaobailou (Small White Building) Conference”to address the implications of Shanxi’s experimental cooperatives, sparking a major debate on the future direction of agriculture in the early years of the PRC. The debate concluded when Mao Zedong affirmed the Shanxi model.

Subsequently, in December 1951, the CPC Central Committee issued the Resolution (Draft) on Mutual Aid and

Cooperation in Agricultural Production, formally establishing the nation’s agricultural development path in the

early years of the PRC.

survey of Shanxi old revolutionary base areas, People’s Daily, agricultural production