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The most important targets for the textile industry in the First Five Year Plan were output of yarn and cloth, and the supply of invest- ment funds, labour, and cotton. The simplest way of evaluating how well

the output targets were achieved is to compare the planned and actual outputs for 1957. This suffers from the disadvantage that an unusually good or bad year, quite common in underdeveloped countries relying heavily on agriculture, can yield misleading results. Since 1957 was a poor year in the textile industry, the First Five Year Plan targets were not reached. The targets had been set at 5 million bales of yarn and 163,721 million bolts of cloth (excluding homespun). The plan took one bolt of cloth as equal to

36.576 metres, so that the cloth target for 1957 should have been equal to 5,988 million metres. However, the State Statistical Bureau [ 1958a:192] reported that the target in the First Five Year Plan was for 5,773 million metres in 1957, and this figure is accepted, since the higher figure is inconsistent with other statements. Actual production in 1957 was 4.65 million bales of yarn and 5,050 million metres of cloth [S.S.B., 1960:99],

so that the planned target was not met. It was claimed that the target for 1957 had been surpassed in 1956 for both yarn and cloth [S.S.B., 1957]. The yarn output in 1956 of 5.25 million bales did surpass the target for 1957 in the First Five Year Plan; the cloth output of 5,770 million metres was very close to but less than the target of 5,773 million metres, but the discrepancy could easily be caused by the rounding process. It must be concluded that the First Five Year Plan targets for cotton textile

output were fulfilled one year early, but, owing to a fall in cotton output in 1956, the running down of stocks in that year, and the subsequent poor

year in the industry, it was not possible to achieve the targets in 1957. In some respects the investment achieved was as important as the output, since the investment laid a foundation for future growth over what was intended to be a series of plans. In the First Five Year Plan the textile industry was to receive 1,160 million yuan or 4.7 per cent of

investment in basic construction in all industries [F.F.Y.P., 1955:29-30] . A later source gave a target figure of 1,2 37.12 million yuan for investment

in the textile industry 1953-57 [S.S.B., 1958a:159] . It seems probable that the later figure represents a revision in the First Five Year Plan, but no revised versions of the plan were published.

In the first four years, the textile industry invested 1,251.92 million yuan which was equal to 7.0 per cent of industrial investment,

not only exceeding the planned investment target for five years but also achieving more than the average [S.S.B., 1958a:159] . However 1957 was a year of recession in construction in textiles and investment funds were supposed to be retrenched. This proved difficult to enforce and as a result the investment total in textiles over the whole five year period was 1,550 million yuan. This exceeded the target [Ch'ien Chih-kuang, 1959] . Investment in the textile industry as a percentage of all

industrial investment fell slightly to 6.4 per cent, but was still well above the original target [Chiang Kuang-nai, 1959].

The planned installation of 1,890,000 spindles and 54,500 looms over the five years was convincingly beaten. By 1957 some 2,400,000 spindles and 61,000 looms had been installed [C.K.F.C., 1958b]. A later report [ Ch'ien Chih-kuang, 1959] gave a figure for newly installed

spindles 1953-57 of 2,010,000, which still exceeded the plan, although by a smaller margin.

Of the fifty-three above-norm textile mills to be built during the period, thirty-eight were for cotton textiles. This target was also exceeded. By the first half of 1956, construction work had actually begun on three cotton mills originally scheduled for the Second Five Year Plan period [N.C.N.A., 1956a]. Between 1949 and 1957, some sixty- nine new textile mills were built, and two were rebuilt. Of these, forty-four were cotton mills and four were dyeing and printing mills

[Chang Fang-tso, 1957] . A report early in 1958 [ C.K.F.C., 1958b] declared that, in the textile industry, sixty-eight above-norm units had been put into production or were just starting production.

Between 1952 and 1956, the number of employees in the textile industry increased from 969,803 to 1,219,693 [ S.S.B., 1958a:174] . With base 1952=100, this gives an index of 125.8 for 1956. A reported change in the number of textile employees in percentage terms can be used to

estimate the numbers in 1957 at 1,184,457 approximately [Chiang Kuang-nai, 1957b]. This yields an index for 1957 of 122.2. It is possible, but

unlikely, that the number of workers decreased greatly in 1957, for state- ments on the handling of the problem of that year made much of reductions in shirt numbers or days worked, and use of substitute raw materials. With regard to surplus workers in that year it was pointed out that the new mills could take on workers transferred from mills with too many workers, although some workers could be admitted into technical schools and temporary workers could be dealt with according to their individual contracts [ Lo Jih-yiin, 1957] . In addition, managers preferred to retain labour even if there

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was not really enough work for them all. Shao Ching-wa [1958], the vice- chairman of the Textile Trade Union of China, gave a figure for textile workers in 1957 of 1,282,440, but the figures may not be comparable, since his figure for 1952 was 801,278 workers, less than the State Statistical Bureau figure for employees and greater than the Bureaus' figure for production workers. If Shao Ching-wa's figures are used, the index for

1957 stood at 160.0.

In the absence of a target in the First Five Year Plan, these results cannot be compared with the intentions. However, the results can be

compared with the index of all industrial workers; in 1957 this stood at 182.4 [S.S.B., 1960:183]. Clearly the textile industry increased employment at a rather lower rate than average.

The productivity of labour increased markedly faster than the

intentions expressed in the Five Year Plan. The target was a 10.4 per cent increase in labour productivity in five years. By 1956, the productivity of labour had increased by 15.7 per cent measured in value of production [S.S.B., 1958a:170], or by 31.6 per cent with no indication of method of computation [ Shao Ching-wa, 1958] . Corresponding figures for 1957 have not been found.

The planned increase in the supply of cotton was the final important target for the development of the textile industry. Cotton yield was

planned to increase by 11.9 per cent to 3,270 million chin, cotton yeild to increase to 34.4 chin per mou, and the sown area to increase to 95 million mou in 1957. Actual cotton output in 1957 was 3,280 million chin, exceeding the target; the yield increased to 38 chin per mou, exceeding the target; and sown area increased to 86.63 million mou, not attaining the target. The shortfall in sown area was more than compensated for by the increased yield.

Overall, the hopes for the textile industry as expressed in the First Five Year Plan were fulfilled.